The Rewatchables - ‘Tropic Thunder’ With Bill Simmons, Chris Ryan, Van Lathan, and Joel Anderson

Episode Date: May 12, 2026

You never go full rewatch. The guys head to the jungles of Vietnam to revisit Ben Stiller’s 2008 action comedy, ‘Tropic Thunder,’ starring Ben Stiller, Robert Downey Jr., Jack Black, Brandon T. Jackson, Matthew McConaughey, and Tom Cruise. Producers: Craig Horlbeck, Chia Hao Tat, Eduardo Ocampo, and Matt Pevic Get more value with the McValue menu at McDonald’s https://www.mcdonalds.com/us/en-us/download-app.html Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Are you one of those media strategy people clicking through slides, scrolling spreadsheets? Yes? Good. This is for you. Because on Spotify, there's an audience that's different. Locked in. Loyal, invested. They're called fans. Fans don't just listen to music. They feel seen by it, like it belongs to them. So when your brand shows up on Spotify, that's who you're talking to. And you're right next to artists like me, Lizzo. So, are you ready to talk to fans? Spotify Advertising. You're among fans. The rewatchables, maybe the last episode ever

was brought to you about Ringer Podcast Network. We can find the press box with Joel Anderson. You can find higher learning. And Midnight Boys, and bring her tailgate with Van Lathen. And then CR, we're taping this a day after game seven of Celtic Sixers.

You went, go ahead. Enjoy yourself. Go. Play your song, do your thing. No, no, no. I was just going to say, you know, I wanted to play a little background music while I was talking.

and I just need you to do something for me. Take a step back and literally fuck your own face. Sierra pulled it off. By the time you hear this, who knows if Joel will still be playing. Please post that before we lose four straight to the next. Anyway,

Traffic Thunder is next. This episode is brought to you by Apple and AT&T. Scroll long enough and you'll hear it all. Miracle diets, fitness trends, you name it. But with iPhone and Apple Watch, you get meaningful insights from a very trusted source. Your body. You can track sleep quality, cardio fitness, and more than unpack all the information in the health app on iPhone to get a picture of your overall health.

These health insights are developed with clinical experts from start to finish. Find out more at Apple.com. health. Apple Watch is not a medical device and should not be used as a substitute for professional medical advice. Wow, Joel Anderson. You're here. You did this. Should I be offended that we're not doing it at your house? We've never been four at my house. We're starting? Already. I'm just saying, Van. Van told me that when they do it at your house, it's three only at the house. We'd have to bump somebody. You had to basically kill CR. Van. have to be here. Just, you know what I'm saying?

We could have put Sarah in blackface. That's true. Wait, don't spoil the second half to buy. Come on, let's come later. Yeah, okay, later. I just, you know, I'm glad to be here, though. I'm very grateful. I have a lot of gratitude for it.

You know, he says you cater food and everything. Did you take lunch orders and shit? That's a joke. Get watered. You know, you said soda. No, no, no, no. I said that when we're watching the games and hanging out of friends. Oh, my bad, okay.

That hasn't happened yet. Because you're never here. You're in the East Coast. That's right. That's right. You lived here a lot of good things would happen for you. I love L.A. And in fact, they were so annoyed with me talking about how much I loved L.A. when I was hanging out on Saturday.

They were like, man, be quiet. I stopped talking about that. I don't know what you're talking about. You did, like, Billy and Tate, they were just like, all right, man, we get it. You know, but I was talking about like, oh, man, the mountains, the fog, just everything. It was gorgeous. The fog. The fog.

It was a lot. There was a little bit of a mist settling over UCLA spring game this weekend. Rose Bowl is beautiful, man. I love being out here. Can we steer it toward traffic thunder? I was about to ask what the fuck is happening. Okay, sorry. Yeah.

Sorry. It is comedy month here of the rewatchables. We've had this one written down for a while. Craig has been pushing for it. I don't know for how long. Five years? Since day one. Since the first movie I did.

It's finally happening. I can't wait to see how it goes. I didn't even where to begin. This movie came out in 2008 and see how far can we push this? Comedies? This is it. It starts there. We did there.

There's something about Mary last week. So that's like eight years before. We go all the way through the mid-2000s and then kind of 2008, 2008, 2009. We're near the end. This is a movie where if it didn't work, I wonder if they would have released it. You know, that's the stakes. It's like if this doesn't come off, if this doesn't play, can you put this in movie theaters? A lot of big stars at the time.

Yeah. Yeah. And I think that was obviously, this is going to sound stupid, like a lot of big stars, that's intentional. but I think part of the charm of the movie is you know all of these guys. These are not the guys. You trust these guys. Look at the familiar faces that are a part of this movie. Even just people showing up, they get to complete buy-in

because they do some really outrageous shit that you have to have trust in the performance for them to be able to pull it off. What's the first year that you start saying, oh, I don't think they can do it? I think whenever, I'm trying to remember like when aggrieved Twitter was at its peak, like 2013, 2014. Yeah, Twitter is. basically rounding in a shape right around now. 2008-2009.

I don't even think I'd been I don't think I joined Twitter until 2009. That's when I was too. I was like spring 2009. So like yeah, it's not even moving the conversation. So I think like by the time that gets a little bit of, you know,

motion and more people are on there. Then I was like, I'd 2013 to the 14? Here's what I got. There's something where Mary's 98. American Pie 99, fucking the pie. 40-year-old virgin.

The aristocrats, the whole Gilbert-Goffrey they make a documentary about it. Borat, no question. Oh, man, poor. Super bad, definitely. And then this movie, and they kind of,

we're about it at the end here. What do you think ended it? Was it social media? Was it like the kind of, the open of the town square of discourse and criticism? Or was it these guys all get too big and you can't mess with the money that much?

Like, what is it? It was happening everywhere, because I felt like it was happening with TV too, right? Because he's bound and downs pushed the number at the same time late 2000s. I mean, you know what? Some of the stuff that we're talking about is pushing the envelope is pushing the envelope in terms of how

zany and daring the comedy is. This is different, though. Yes. Like, this is legitimately hitting at what some people would say are marginalized communities, special disabilities, special needs people, should I say, black people, gay people.

Viet Congs? Vietnam. There's not a lot of... Via Cong. Kong's, you know. There's no ass. You wouldn't say Chinese. You wouldn't say Chinese. There's not a lot of movies in this run that you guys are talking about that go for this.

Something about Mary is definitely one of them. Yeah. Definitely one of them. But they're not that many movies that go directly where Tropic Thunder goes. Do you get credibility, though, when you have this many stars and proven people in it, did they get to push the envelope more at that point? I guess it depends on who you get credibility with, right? Because, like, yeah, Tom Cruise, Ben Stiller, like all these guys.

Jack Black, they have credibility with people down. Yeah, they have credibility with a certain kind of comedy community. But again, by the time we start getting to the height of Twitter, like 2013, 2014, I don't even think they would be able to pull that off with them. Like, I don't think people would buy that shit from Robert Downey Jr. And when you think about the fact that this is the same year Iron Man comes out, so this is the sort of completion of his renaissance, you know, his career revival. But he's not that far into becoming an insurable.

actor again when he does this. Which on the one hand is crazy that he did it, but on the other hand it makes sense because you're like, he wouldn't do this today. I don't think anybody in this movie would do Tropic Thunder today. Not because of like necessarily the content.

It's too big of a gamble. You think that that's different from, because I saw an interview he did from like 2020, 21. He said, well, I don't regret it. Something like that. Yeah, I did a little prep, man. I talked I was studying. He was like, I don't regret it, but I wouldn't

do it again. Yeah. He didn't say I wouldn't do it again. He just said I don't regret it, basically. I think that they had a pretty serious, like, intellectual reasoning behind the Kirk character, which is obviously like the one that's like the thing that you'd be like, could you pull that off today?

I like some of the quotes that Stiller had about it's just like, look, we're making fun of actors and how movies are made. And this is like the nth degree of all of this stuff. We're just taking as far as we can go, but that's the whole point in the movie. you're either with us or you're not.

You know, I have this in what's the most 2008 thing about the movie. We were still in the era to where funny one. I agree. If it was funny, then people would, there would be a certain group of people that would have an issue with it, problems, and we could have conversations. But if it was funny, that was the most important thing. Everybody kind of got the joke together.

Yeah. And if it worked that way, then it was cool. Now, obviously, we came out of that, right? We came out of that partly because Hollywood pushed us out of it. There were several egregious things that happened in the 2010s, like, you know, casting Scarlett Johansson and Ghost in the Shell, like casting movies with white men, where everyone went, no, we need to have a conversation about the racial dynamics

and politics that exists in Hollywood. And that kind of overshadowed a lot of the other stuff. But at this point, it was still like, if you went to this movie and you laughed at that character, that was enough. Craig has a theory. Oh, here we go. Okay. What was your last...

When did you think the last funny comedy was? Did we say this is the end? Yeah, my joke was that this is the end. Neighbors? Of that era. Neighbors? Is iters right after it? Neighbors technically came after.

But it's that like 2014 range. I think it's mostly because, like, I think this movie is a great example of the Ben Stiller group. They were all in their early 40s at this point. They were at the peak of their powers. It was kind of like Apex Mountain for what can we get away with? And I think this is the end was the same thing. for the Seth Rogen crew.

They were all kind of reaching 40 years old. They have kind of done everything. They're like, all right, what's one last thing we can get away with? And then there was no new group that came up below those guys, which is why I think there's no Tropic Thunders or This is the Ends now

because, like, no group really like supplanted them and came after them. And then 2017 things changed, you know, culture got different. What changed, man? What changed? What changed? I like to hear it.

What's happening? At the end of the 2010s, culture changed. For real. 90 breezes. There's changed. There's a lot of. But, you know, there's also,

there's a massive, massive sea change in Hollywood, which is a lot of the people, several people in this movie, especially Downey, start participating in Marvel. In Marvel and in large-scale superhero franchises. And you can't really fuck with the money on those.

Like, the next Tropic Thunder should have been about Marvel movies, right? You would do, like, I can't believe we're on movie 11 of this, and you would have all, all the fake trailers and the documentaries. The boys does that a little bit.

It does a little bit, but not in a, this is a movie. And there was an HBO show like a year or two ago that kind of came and went that was a little bit about this. But it's, it's, Tropic Thunder can make fun of something. And you can be conversant in Platoon and Apocalypse now and be like, this is so funny the way they're making fun of this. But even if you haven't seen it, you'd still laugh at some of the things that are happening. Yeah. Tropic Thunder, too, is like scorcher, eight then, right? Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. I have a lot of scorch. I think I would have seen at least the first two in the theater. But I'm not sure the thought was. So this was one of the most successful Hollywood parody movies, I think, ever. Yeah. And when you talk about Big Picture, the player network, what else is in there? Were they really flit?

That was a recent show? It was a really bad one called Burn Hollywood Burn to have some people in it. I think at this point now, it's like the studio. The studio is the version. Trying to think of more. The studio, I think, probably was influenced by this movie at some degree. Oh, yeah. The Kevin Bacon, the Kevin Bacon,

that's the big picture. That's the big one. That's the big picture. Yeah, Kevin Bacon and Terry Hatcher, all that was people in there. Yeah, sure. Swimming of Sharks. Was that one of them? Yeah, that was the agent.

There's been a couple of, like, agent, like, hurly-burly. But then you know what you also have, like, around this same time is you have entourage. Yeah. And, Lloyd! And entourage is legitimate. Ultimately, another thing that pushes it so far with some of the stuff that's happening that you probably couldn't do now, which is another reason why maybe that movie was like not well received when it came out.

But Entourage is kind of doing the same thing at the same time. You know how you were, when we were doing Ghostbusters and we were kind of going through the montage that they have, the fame montage. Yeah, the 84 montage. And you were like, this is just the fucking best. Like, I love the 80s. This was so great. 84.

Do you feel that way about 08? Like when you're rewatching Entourage or you're watching Tropic Thunder, stuff from back then. Are you ever like 08 was the best, man? It's just... Housing prices were low. You're talking to pre-social media, though. You guys, this is hard for being able to talk about.

Because he's walking the line. He's got to be sensitive to the concerns of the people now. But at the same time, that was your era. Doc in the big three. That was your time. Obama? Obama. Say it.

Say it. Yeah. Sarah Palin and Tina Feyn. Get the fuck out of you. You know what I love to. about 08, Obama. Get the fuck out of it. I mean, he wasn't even president.

He inspired me. He wasn't even president. I think you're right. It was like, this wasn't the last good year, but it was like the last, it was like the last year that everything didn't seem headed for a downward trajectory. It was also, there was enough distance from 9-11, and it just felt like there was a hopefulness, I think, as we headed into late 2000s, that now seems like it happened a million years ago. This movie benefited from being in 08 because there was no, like, out of the moment. of context commentary on it. Like, you had to go see the movie to really know what was in the movie.

And if it came out now, there would just be clips and screenshots and it would just get destroyed before people even went to go see it. Yeah. Yeah, that is true. Now, I will say that throughout the mid-20, I was still having a lot of fun, 2015, 2014, 2016, like, I'm at TMZ going crazy, right? I'm still having a lot of fun. What do you mean?

What's that mean? We're going nuts. We're going nuts. We're going nuts. We're going nuts. You're going nuts. He's in the city? It's going nuts.

It's going nuts, right? You trust it. But in this, with this movie, with these types of movies, like a lot of stuff happened. First of all, some of these guys, not necessarily so much in this movie, but like some of these guys started getting in trouble. Like there's a comedy purge that happens once the Me Too movement comes out and you start to see the way some of these guys, not necessarily in this movie, but around the way they acted in their personal lives. And really, that ripped the heart out of what a lot of, I'm not saying that that was a bad thing. I'm just saying you legitimately lost some of these careers

when we're talking about some of these comedy dudes. Like, they didn't even last throughout the scrutiny of the mid to late 2010s. You know who was able to avoid this the entire time was Larry David with curb. He was always able to push the envelope on whatever he wanted. And then even after everything else changed, he still kept cranking out seasons

and still even made seasons this decade. and almost seemed like he got a hall pass for it. Some people get hall passes. Like, Barclay had one forever. There's a hall pass element to it, but I think that the thing that's crucial is if you're going to make fun of other groups of people or basically anybody else,

and this is what this movie actually does do. You have to be the buddy of the joke. And Larry is always the most awkward, difficult, funniest person on curb. No matter who he's making fun of, Larry is always the one you're like, I can't believe this guy needs a napkin that bad, that he's going to do.

And Larry always loses. And Lillard and Downey and Jack Black, like, yeah, they get a moment of heroism at the end. But the people who are most worthy of ridicule in this movie are the stars in the movie. Right. Yeah, man, it's just too bad because I was thinking about the Palestinian chicken episode, right? And it was like, yo, like, I think he actually could still do that today, though. So I think we're, I don't know, I mean, again, I don't work in Hollywood,

you know what I'm saying? This is one of my few times out here in L.A. But I just kind of feel like they're still Don't look like that I just feel a little energy Just let me finish Just let me finish Should we go

Come back to that But no I think the thing is You could still do that I mean the same kind of comedy That prevails in Tropic Thunder Is still out there You can find it

On the internet or wherever It's just not You know A big Hollywood It might not be a big Hollywood movie or whatever, but you can still find people doing blackface and walking up on people calling them nigger. That was, you know, that's a

cut the builder. Yeah, Chuck the builder. Yeah, Chuck the builder. Well, that's different podcasts. We'll talk about that. Oh, yeah, that's right. Sorry, I didn't mean to make it a that a little comment. That's okay. I also Like, Joe said the N-word with the arm and Bill's brain detonating. Like, is that?

I'm sorry. I just find Joe that don't have a safe space to give his opinion? Bill's just like I'll order a different sweatshirt. Bill was like, that's a line from the departed. I should have asked if I have permission to do that. You do. Get your shit off, bro. All right, Doug.

Come on. Do it up. I forgot what I was going to say. I know you did. I had a good point. I'll remember it a half hour from now. So it's making fun of two different genres. All these Vietnam movies we grew up watching.

And then all of these Oscar Bills. movies that I just feel like pre-social media we're all making fun of this stuff and you might see it in essays and blog posts and whatever but I don't feel like we made fun of some of this stuff enough like have you ever seen I AM Sam

or some of these ones these are like regarding Henry we've always talked about for dramas that are now comedy's month but all these actors they couldn't resist and then when it would hit on Forrest Gump then the next actor would feel like they had to do some sort of

you know, Oscar-bait movie, but I always loved that this movie made fun of that. And the Vietnam stuff is, like, I kind of think about the scene in true romance when Clarence Worley is like, man, did you make coming home in a body bag? That's my favorite fucking movie. It's like, this is almost making fun more

of coming home in a body bag than it is like the deer hunter, you know, and coming home in a body bag is a fictional movie from True Romance. And a lot of homage stuff that you know if you're like a die-hard fan of all this stuff, like even still or something, character starting to lose it at the end and thinking that half squats his son.

He's found his people. And it's basically apocalypse now, right? But it's, they're not blatant you, hitting you over the head with that. You have to kind of know. One thing that social media did was it allowed everyone to run to their corners, coalesce around each other, and then form things to get offended about, right? And I'm not saying that. Oh, you're not saying people too woke, huh?

No, I'm not saying people too woke. I'm saying like, even like right now, like the film bro, community, the subjects of King Shong fantasy, the film bro community, right? They get offended. Like, they get offended about stuff like, this movie is

legitimately making fun of the culture of the Oscars. Of the culture of serious filmmaking being an endeavor that is completely cynical. This movie is making fun of that. I screenshot it. They have the

they have the five-month movies nominees and Hanks is in a wheelchair with his arm like he won some sort of wheelchair race I don't know Who's in the operating?

That Sean Pinn as a As a blind guy And John Voight right John Voight and then Toby McGuire In the Satan's Alley Which I own on 4K Blue Right It's pretty great So like what I'm saying is like now

There is a holy grail To some of this stuff There would be people that would be offended by some of this that think, you know, the Oscars now and the conversation around it because of podcast and all of that stuff, it's just more different and robust than even I remember it from before. It's like,

it's the biggest part of somebody's here to seriously talk about. I think Oscarology was more of a niche pursuit. And now it's not uncommon. I mean, maybe we have a bias because we live in Los Angeles and it comes up a lot, but like, you'll hear people be like, oh, I heard that movie

has a really good shot in the Oscars. Right, that was the dialogue. That kind of started than the 90s and then got even better in 2000s. I, as a movie fan, especially somebody on illegal cable box for years and years when I was watching all these movies, was offended by how bad some of the movies are. You said you had a what?

I had illegal cable box. Don't try to, like... Charlestown for years. And a legal cable bag, like your gym. Yeah. Don't try to... We paid Big Al to come over. He souped up our box.

We got all the pay-per-views for like... Wow. Now, this is amazing. This is interesting. I loved it. I've never heard you talk about your criminal exploits on any podcast. before.

You talked about it. CIRS heard about this. Yeah. I've talked about Big Al. I thought maybe you was doing this for me and Joe. As a younger person, I used to tell him about, like, you switch the channels back and forth really fast to get Skinnamax. What crimes have you committed? I can't really talk about it.

This is my favorite crime I ever committed because it would be the pay-per-views and they would be just on every two hours. That's fucking amazing. So these movies would come on like Patch Adams and they would just be on Channel or whatever. And you'd be like, what the fuck were they doing? How did anyone, what dreams make comments? with Robin Williams Oh, I love that movie. You like that movie?

I am saying. Like, they would just make shit movies year after year. Oh, yeah. But radio's based on a real person, though. You know what I mean? I don't mind radio. I don't mind radio.

You don't mind radio. You don't mind radio. Somebody are. It's okay. Some of these movies are. But also, remember, serious movies at a time were about serious topics.

And sometimes somebody's, when you, somebody's like, They don't fit into society for whatever reason. They're having trouble. That was a serious topic. But this started in TV in the, really the late 70s, early 80s with the after-school specials

and different strokes in these shows where somebody just sent me one today about the time Arnold and his buddy were on the street. They got molested. Oh, no, I'm kidding. Somebody had a seizure in front of them. And this lady just has a seizure for like a very special episode. It was a special episode about some. seizures.

I know you're going to remember this. This is how you learned about stuff. Do you remember the Ben Affleck one when he was taking steroids? The steroids. He punches the one. Yeah. You got to remember that. What Helen Hunt jumping off?

Helen Hunt jumping off. She was on acid, right? Yeah. Yeah. by Mary. Jack Black at a really weird point in his career trying to stay on top. King Kong, 2005, Holiday 2006,

which I think has had a lot of legs. He did the Tenacious D movie. Is it Margo the wedding in 2007? Yeah. It's kind of like, am I a comedy actor? What am I? So he's at that point. And then Downey, as CR mentioned,

putting together his comeback of Zodiac, Tropic Thunder, Iron Man, where all of a sudden he's an A-plus-plus list of him. Yeah, it's starting to finally pick up after Kiss Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is like, hey, I can be bonded. I had forgotten how close that was to the time that he had been in prison.

Yeah, right. And couldn't get insured. Right, because that was the thing up to a point, I think probably when I saw this movie, I thought of Robert Downey Jr. That was the junkie. You know what I mean? Like, that was a guy who was a probably, that was what he was known for. That was what he was

what all the stores were. Yeah. McConaughey. Don't know. Trying to hang on to the A list. He was in a wilderness. After this movie, he does, fools gold, Surfer Dude, Ghosts of Girlfriends Pass, Lincoln Lawyer. Like, it's not going well. Well, the Lincoln Lawyer is a good movie, but it does, it comes on the hills of that. He's in the wilderness.

Is it a good movie? Oh, like, yeah, I think the Lincoln Lawyer is a good movie. Like. Is Lincoln Lawyer a good movie? Yeah, I don't know if I, I don't know if I remember what happens. Lincoln Lawyer is okay? Yeah, it's like actually a pretty enjoyable thriller. But it's like him kind of getting his footing back because he is flirting with obscurity during this time.

Yeah. Like Hollywood. This is like after Sahara. Yeah. A couple rom-coms that went sideways. Don't know what to do with them. And then in the next decade, obviously, Dallas Byers Club, Interstellar, True Detective, all of these things are going to bring him back.

But him in this movie right now is him staying on the tips of people's talk. The actual start of the McConaissance. So, like, mostly people think it's Magic Mike, Dallas Byers Club, Wolf of Wall Street, True Detective, Interstellar, in some order. No, it's this. But I actually think it's this and Eastbound are, like, kind of like, they're like, oh, this guy. has like a whole other gear that he can play with.

And also... And he also is, crucially, yes. He's like, I'll play a supporting part. Yeah. Like, I don't have to lead everything I'm in. It's probably easy to sell them on that. Joel play a supporting part. My line is one of the four on the reratch ones.

All I got to do is get some rebounds. I got five phones. Y'all not listening to Tellgate. That's Joel podcast. It's not. You're not listening to Telgate. Joel is out there every day. I'm a role player, man. Like Yokich putting up rebounds, assists.

That's actually winning. That's the big board I come for him. Exactly. Let me tell you, when we went to Rosebow, everybody's coming up the van and the motherfucker, man. I was like, I was like, I just feel to be famous. All right, let's move on. People, okay.

Tom, we more on McCona Hay later. Tom Cruise, he's at another crazy point. We're three years after Oprah's sofa. We're in the middle of the Katie Holmes weirdness. Oh, man. We're with that weird Scientology interview he did. We have Paramount dumping him. And he's about to follow this up with Valkyrie

and night and day with Cameron Diaz. Can I ask you a question about whether we look back at this? In 08, there was a part of me that was like is Les Grossman kind of cringy. Not because I didn't like the character, but it was like he's trying really, really hard in this moment. Like, no?

So when I first saw this movie, this is the first movie I ever went to a screening of. It's Tropa Thunder. This is my first screening ever that I ever went to. You took Sasha Gray? Oh, boy. Don't get me started, though. There's some people that

like five special place. I almost forgot I was about to say. But, I'm serious. Because there's this one She's in like a... He's in like a... Go back to the screen. Well, I actually want to sauce a great story.

But it's in the movie. It's like, this is still. So like, this is the first screening ever. This is going to sound so crazy, y'all. Not to the end. I did not know it was him. Yeah. That's a recurring theme in the research.

Most people didn't know his Cruz. I did not know it was him. And then the guy, Tim Wells, producer I was working with at the time, goes, stay, watch this. He was getting ready to leave. And it's like, Tom Cruise. I'm like, what the shit?

And I thought to myself that exact same thing, even back then I'm like, why did he show up in this? But he was so universally reviled at that point. Yeah. Like, it's so difficult for people. I think the two biggest comeback stories in modern Hollywood memory

are both in this movie. Robert Downey Jr. and Tom Cruise. I think Travolta's in there, too. Travolta's absolutely in there, right? That's actually a great point. But like, so three, but like he was so universally the weird guy. Shut up, man. He was universally the weird guy.

He did some good stuff from 2000. Did some, had some golf, had some celebrity golf. I mean, man, he was a correspondent on the camp on California. I was speaking of, O.J. Simpson. Do you know who advocated for him at the Rose Bowl? Not advocating. We're going in there and Joe is making sure that O.J. Simpson is in the Rose Bowl Hall of Fame. It just would be absurd if you went to the Rose Bowl Hall of Fame and you didn't mention O.J.

That's what I thought. And I just wanted to make sure. That's a valid point. Yeah, and he was listed there among the people then ended up into the Rose Bowl. I think that's fair. But I also think it's kind of interesting to walk into the Rose Bowl Hall of Fame. And the first thing you say is where's OJ? I think what he's saying is true.

I think also. Fish young folks. No, you did. It's okay. Let's continue. So you saw screening, had no idea, it was Tom Cruise, which was most people. Did you know Tom Cruise was in this when you saw it? That's hard for me to remember in 2008, but I watched it with Liz who had never seen this movie,

and she did not know it was Cruz until halfway through the movie. I said, you know that's Tom Cruise, right? Was she like, what the one? Yes. It's really good makeup. Yeah. And it's physically, it just doesn't seem like him. They also kept him from all promotional materials.

Like, they did, like, they were, they, I think they sued, like, a tabloid for taking pictures. of him going from like his trailer to the set. But there was a moment there where like maybe it's more like after the movie came out where I felt like he was obviously not a trained comedian

because he was like overworking the joke a little bit and it felt like for a second you could get him to show up as Les Grossman at like college game game. You know what I mean? It's like less Grossman was available.

It felt like. Yeah. I think he was just happy. He just wanted people to clap pool because he did it at MTV. He did it at the MTV. Yeah, with Jennifer Lopez. It kind of didn't work that well, but he was just happy that people were like,

oh, that's Tom Cruise. See, I thought instead of being reviled, I thought more than anything, people thought he was weird, you know. And that's more than, that's more, that's different than being reviled because people like, I don't know. The Katie Holmes thing, I think, turned people up. The Katie Holmes thing, but also the Matt Lauer thing. Oh, he was yelling at Matt Lauer.

Yelling at Matt Lauer, the whole deal. Like, people were like, this guy's an asshole. Like, what is he talking about? he's too far going. Paramount dumping his deal was a pretty crazy thing to think back on. And the Spielberg breakup

had happened a couple of years before that too. And then the last one in this, Nick Nolte, former A-Lister from the 70s and 80s. Most normally they play Jack Hates.

Are you shocked enough? He's 85 years old? How is he still alive? 85 years. Yeah, I mean, he'd seem like a guy that should have died at like 67. I think he's the only one

that they had to replace on SNO when he was guess that was one of the famous Eddie Murphy episode because Nick would just party too hard and couldn't host it. The crazy thing is that he doesn't look that much older in Crime 101 that he did in Tropic Thunder. Like,

it's basically like he hit old age and just has been there. An amazing run for him. It's one of those that when he dies nobody's going to be like, what? He's worn his career. I mean, even we were talking about Downey, I mean, he had gotten arrested like a bunch of fucking times. Like, going to lead it

into this too. And I was just kind of, you just kind of expected that. Like, I felt like he and Gary Busey were kind of like the same person to me a little bit. It was just like, oh, those are the old guys from the 80s who are always like getting DUIs and shit like that. Yeah, you know what there was like a weird thing talking about the difference between now and 08? There was more of a distance. I feel like with celebrity then. So like when Downey would get arrested, you'd be like, oh, and then you'd kind of keep it moving.

Yeah. But now it would be like, what's the first pod down he's going to go on after this and like, people writing these parissocial posts about it. You would never be able to get away from it. Call her daddy. Come on. I will say that there was something about Robert Donnie Jr. at that time, though. All of the trouble that he was having, like, Hollywood was mourning it.

Yeah. Like, Hollywood was like, Hollywood was mourning. He had been around for so long. Yeah, going back to, like, weird science and the pickup artists and all of these movies. And then he peaked with Chaplin. Yeah. He's in the James'clock. Tobeck movie, he starts to get into the weird indie thing at the end of the 90s.

Then he comes out on Allie McBill, and it's like, oh my God, he might be back, but then he can't stay straight for that. People were really sad for whatever reason. You could tell, even in the tabloids the way they were cover it, how well liked he was. And they were happy when he got it together. Yeah. Like when he got straight and came back and delivered an Iron Man, delivered in Zodiac, delivered it in this. People were, they rolled out the red carpet for him to strung back into the town. I'm just going to see Downey and U.S. Marshals every couple of years.

And it would be like, oh, man, that guy could have been a contender. It was almost like an athlete. Yeah. Well, you think of like, oh, man, Kenny Anderson. We only get this shit together. It's like, how many of those did we have in basketball and football over the years? Dwight Gooden? Yeah.

Kenny Anderson was the man. He was. We're going to take a quick break and then more to discuss with this movie. This episode is brought to you by McDonald's. Right now at McDonald's, you can get great deals all day with McValue. That's right. Jump Start your day with the. under $3 menu featuring a sausage McMuffin for just $1.50.

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Ben Stiller has tugged Speedman Hit it big with the Scorcher franchise They made six I was getting to this later Let's do it now What's Scorcher about? What's happening in Scorcher? Is it like a global warming

They tell you in the first trailer The Earth has stopped spinning So in Scorcher The Earth has stopped spinning So because the Earth has stopped spinning I guess volcanoes and the atmosphere It's like a day after tomorrow kind of vibe Basically

But he's like He's like, commando. He's like, Schwarzinger. He's some sort of commando who is saving people in this post-apocalyptic deal. The Earth has become a scorcher and it's destroyed. So each sequel, it's still the same premise. The Earth has still still still. Until he's colder.

Yeah. I think the last one was like, it was like, it got colder. Yeah. I honestly not against the premise. Like, I would at least give one. If it was Gerard Butler and Scorcher, I'm like not, not pay-per-viewing that. I did not know what that movie Greenland was. Okay?

I did not know what it was. You think it was scorcher? I was going to the movie. Greenland, I watched for the first time Saturday. That is legitimately a fucking good movie. Dude, brother doesn't miss that often, man.

I expected Greenland to be corny. But watching it, they're trying to get on the plane the whole night. It's legitimately a good movie. So he, uh, Joel, he went serious after all the scorch. He was once the biggest star in the world. Oh.

Ended up playing Simple Jack, a special needs farm boy who can talk to animals. I feel like we've got to do cops, right? Who is Tom Cruise? He's Tom Cruise? It's Cruz? Really? No, no, no, no.

Cruz had all the prestige in the 80s. I think the reason why Tom Cruise is in this movie is because he thinks it's funny that Stiller is doing a riff off of him because Stiller had been doing a Tom Cruise character for a long time years. And they've done the like, I'm Tom Cruise's stunt double thing.

Yeah, he's definitely Tom Cruise to me. I thought it was like a cross between Cruz and the Mission Impossible's and like Stallone just trying to keep Rambo going crossed with nine other Hollywood. Well, and also those guys would often make, now, none of them I don't think did something like Simple Jack, but they would every once in a while make like a family movie where you'd be like, what the fuck are you doing, man? You're John Claude Van Dam.

Is there a world where Simple Jack could have worked? Like, was Downey, right? I think Kirk Lazarus lays out how. I think Simple Jack needed a special skill. Yeah, you need to be good at Blackjack. Because if he could talk to farm animals, that's the, you'd become an asset on the farm. It's the thing I was just trying to. determine. Is Forrest Gump

that far off, Simple Jack, or not? I couldn't tell, like, good at ping pong. Good at ping pong and talk to the president. Right. Force breakdown as wet-ch and Richard Nixon. Started a running movement. So, Scorcher Six Global Meltdown was supposed to be the comeback.

Yeah. I like that title, too. All right, so that's him. Then we have Jack Black as Jeff Portnoy, a movie comic star with a stealth heroin problem. I would describe to him as Adam Sandler crossed with later Coriarty Murphy crossed with late 70s

Balushi and Farley maybe Farley and Sam Farley Yeah Recently the star of the Fatty's Fart 2 I absolutely would have seen this with both of my kids Oh yeah I've seen the Fatties and the Fatties Part 2 I was trying to imagine like it sounds great

It's a great idea Ben Simmons's level of interest in Fatty's Over Tropic Thunder would have been like off the charts No question we would have owned it on multiple platforms Forms, streaming, DVD, great idea. Still time. The White Nuddy Professor, man. Yeah.

Robert Downey Jr. is Kirk Lazarus, Australian Method actor. Yeah. Five-time Oscar winner. That would be the record, by the way. It would be a chapter. That was an epic that they made him the all-time leading Oscar winner. Star of Satan's Alley. And then also played Neil Armstrong and Moonshot.

Whenever I found out what the premise, what was the premise of Moonshot? I don't know, but he had... Is it like a thriller? Like he had to like reaclimate himself to the Earth's atmosphere coming back from that movie. It's supposed to be a combination of Russell Crow, Colin Farrell, and Dan Day Lewis, yeah. It felt like a lot of Russell Crow.

Well, the Australian part. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like him naked on the balcony. But the method part is DDL. He was supposed to be Irish. In some of the research I saw, the character was supposed to be Irish. And he's like, no, I can do Australian.

I can do Australian. I had controversial pigmentation alteration. I like the shot of them in the operating room. He's like, yeah. Steve Coogan plays director Damien Cockburn. Yeah. The director of Tropic Thunder. I guess in the research that said this was inspired by

director Richard Stanley's experience directing the island of Dr. Moreau. A movie that I've wanted to do for the rewatchable for eight years. Did you watch Raines of Madness, the Hearts of Darkness of Tropic Thunder? The By Thoreau? Yeah. Yeah. So there's more Damien in that. And he talks about how he's, what is he, 50% Werner Herzog,

50% Francis Coppola, and 50% Peter Bugdonovan. And he's like, well. It's too many percentages. You guys in an island of Dr. Murrow? I love it. General's a movie. What I mean? Like Marlon Brando.

Just that movie? Yeah, of fucking crazy it is. Yeah. It's nuts. I love late stage Brando. I love it. I made it a gimmick at Grantland with the island of Dr. Simbo.

See, I thought it was the most D-Rampus thing at every day in the comm. Although I came around to Burr-Wester. It was just like a hodgepodge mailbag that I named after the Dr. Morrell movie because I was the only one that liked it. That was another one with Big House Cable Box.

We were just watching it over and over again. And after like nine times, you kind of got it. Yeah. I understand what they were trying to do. Kember didn't want to be in the movie is the problem. I blame. I blame that was one where Val Mill did. There would be at Grantland,

like, Bill would come up with a gimmick and then walk off and then it would be up to us to kind of see it through. But like, he would be like, 93 days until the NBA season. Let's do a post every day about counting it down. And then he'd come back like day 61. He's like, oh, you guys are still doing that? We're like, what the fuck are we going to say?

It's August. Well, we did that, remember for the, we did that for NFL, right? Because we had two sports in a lockout. Yes. So we had to start doing a countdown to when we were going to actually get sports. Yeah. Oh, man. Sad times.

Nick Nolte as four-leaf Tayback. Danny McBride is Cody Underwood. Big McBride run here. Hot Rod, pineapple, Thunder, eastbound, all in three years. He's just in our lives, for real. When he's about to do the explosives run, he's like, Damien, Damien,

I need to put some Tiger Balls. It's like, he is really, like, you can tell the vibrations coming off of him that he's like a significant guy. He's one of those that. Craig, did we? we have enough all-MBA teams and MVP ballots for him

over the years. He's like the funniest guy in the 2000s that never became a star. Yeah, man. Could a guy like that... He became a star. He became a, to me,

became like a force. Yeah. Like a force. Not like a... I mean, he was never... He said like 12 years of an HBO show. I know 12 years of HBO shows and then also creatively

because he was the creative force behind a lot of this stuff and stuff like that. To me, it got to a point to where he was the most consistently funny line reader in the town.

For sure. Like, he said a line, the line was funny. That was, this is the end. This is the end. Yeah, this is what he talks, you laugh. First season if he's spending down is all time. Yeah. You know what the problem was is that

when you would see him outside of that arena and like if you watch Prometheus and Danny McBride's in pre-Premant or he couldn't. You couldn't wrap your head around it. In Covenant, you're just like, yo man. Like, when is he going to do Kenny Powers? And it's almost It's like too much.

Yeah, I can see that. I don't know where he ranks on the funniest people of the 21st century for me. I don't think he's out of the top ten. His PER is like top three. I mean, pound for pound, he's number one, maybe. I don't think he's out of the top ten for me. I'm going to mention a movie that not a lot of people love,

but it's legitimately one of the funniest movies that I love. Did you guys see Your Highness? Yeah. Oh, yeah, a long time ago. Yeah. Hesterical. Like legitimately. Like, it's stupid, but like hysterical.

You know the great thing about him, too, is anybody who's in a scene with them, they also automatically get 10% funnier. So when he's seen with Will Ferrell, you're like, this is the funniest thing I've ever seen in my life. But he can make, like, John Hawks hilarious. You know, like the dude from Deadwood who's in Eastbound. Right. Natalie Portman, and Your Highness is, like, really funny.

It's just, the only person I've ever seen not make more funny is Nicknulty. It's just like, well, like, it's just, It's just no idea. Well, that was the thing. I was just like, well, I guess we'll talk about it later. But that pairing, I had a really high expectation for them, you know? When I showed my son Eastbound when he was finally old enough, he had the same look on his face for three episodes that Jack Black does when he sees the pile of heroin.

It was just every funny bone possible, just slamming. It was everything he would want, Kenny Powers. Jay Barrishow is Kevin Sandusky. Not knowing that the same thing. Dundsky thing had not happened. Man, that had not happened yet. That's five years. Unfortunately, last name. I think he's really good at this movie? Yes.

I was thinking about casting couch later. I'm like, oh, who should? And I was like, you know what? I really liked him. He's also the only one playing in the lane lines. He's like, I know I'm not supposed to be the funny one in this movie. And then, uh, Brandon T. Jackson is Alpochino. Alpacino, yeah. It's my guy.

Unbelievable. Is he really your dude? That's my man. Brandon T. Jackson's a homie of mine. He was on a run. He was on a run during this time, all big movies. Percy Jackson, Big Mama's House, like a lot of big movies who was in. And this kind of was like, he was a very familiar face in Hollywood at the time. He's excellent in this movie. He's great.

He is. He is not on my casting couch. I would not replace him. Really? No. Because there was some Kevin Hart stuff that we'll talk about later. But like, you know, like we're still kind of in Chappelle range where he could have, I think, played this. But there's, I think he's actually really good.

I thought he goes toe to toe with everybody in the movie and he's good. He also was a businessman with the Bust the nut candy bars and booty sweater. Booty sweat. Booty sweats. We'll talk about him later. And then Cruz is Les Grossman. So the producer, Stuart Cron,

we did an oral history of Les Grossman for Greenland. And apparently Tom read the script. There was no Les Grossman. And he said, I think you need another villain. What about some greedy pig studio executive represents the gross part of Hollywood? and then Cruz developed a lot of it wanted oversized

prosthetic cans they put them in a fat suit bald cap kind of Jill Silver-ish yeah but they say it was Weinstein Silver and one other it's weird in the research they're like

it wasn't based on anyone but I never believe that I always feel like somebody's based on somebody yeah Joel Silver is a good one yeah but I think the screaming at people is rooting and then Bill Hader early Bill Hader

early young as assistant and then McConaughey is Rick Peck. Is there a third Peck? There's Walter. Walter Peck, Dennis Peck from Internal Affairs and Rick Peck. Rick Peck? Could have done Peck Month.

We should do another category that's like which Peck should be in this movie? Best Peck. And then a ton of cameos. What's your favorite cameo in this, Joel? Man, you know, Tar Binks. That's a good one. Tyler Binks is great. I mean, because first of all, she's playing. Oh, Van Gis. I know that look. God. That was a nostalgic.

I used to love her look. That was probably the last time I looked at Tyra Banks and I was like, that's it right there. You know what I mean? Well, I mean, nothing happened to her. I'm not meaning to be disrespectful. She's still a beautiful woman. But, I mean, everything we know about her now,

she was cruising back then. She was cruising. Yeah. I avoid for his reaction. Not winning the Oscar. Yeah, I, Toby McGuire, man. Little Wonder Boys, throwback? A little Wonder Boys.

Touching the prayer beads. That's hilarious. Lance Bass just showing up. He's like, I'll do it. Oh, Lance Bass. That was pretty good. They said they only had like three hours with Toby because he was flying somewhere.

So they had to film like all of his stuff. They had like this short window to get it done. He had like a poker game in Macau. He had to go to go see. Probably. It was going to Bali's game. The premise, which 10 soldiers went for return, three wrote books.

Only one was turned into a movie about a secret assignment in 1969. still had developed it because he was shooting Empire of the Sun he had a small part and thought some of the actors were very self-important and self-absorbed and self-involved

and appeared to believe they were actually part of the military So I was trying to figure out who he was talking about I and B research. It's like Malcovich is the person he is in that movie with those are the two American soldiers who adopt Christian Bale when they're on this base in Japan

but yeah It's hard to tell because I don't think of Malcovic as somebody who would be like, I'm a soldier now, but maybe I'm wrong. You know what's interesting about this though? And I like Ben Stiller. I do think he has reputation for taking himself a little too seriously and it's funny that

he came up with this movie because he noticed people taking themselves too seriously. Isn't that part of the rapism? Kind of the genius part of this movie is people like all these actors are beating people to the punch with the criticism you would level at them. You know what I mean? It's like Tom Cruise is going to like lampoon

Hollywood so you can't really lampooned Tom Cruise. Ben Stiller is lampooning self-involved leading men. That means he's kind of bulletproof about it. It's interesting tactic. With the exception of Downey, though, don't you... I'm sure we'll talk about this later. Don't you all kind of feel like they're playing basically

a version of themselves? Yes. Right. And even Downey, they make sure to put in the character that this guy has like a bad boy off-screen image and stuff like that. So Downey is playing who people thought he was maybe like 93 or 94.

All right. Did you ever still on your pod? I think I did. Yeah. Who? In the late 2010s. Wait, what? After this?

After Tropic Thunder. After Tropic, yeah. Wait, what? I was asking if you ever had Stiler on his pod. Oh, really? Oh, shit. Okay. All right, let's talk Downey and Kirk Lazarus.

I'll just give you some quotes. Downey said, at the end of the day, it's always about how well you come into the character. If I didn't feel like it was morally sound, where that would be easily misinterpreted, that I'm just C. Thomas Howell and Soulman. It's tough.

I would have stayed home. C-T-H drive-fi. C-T-H just like, what did I do? I'm over here. I was just working actor. I was thinking of because I think Soul Man was one of the first movies that's on a VHS tape. And we got it from Blockbuster. And at the time, I don't remember thinking it was all that offensive.

My parents loved that movie. It wasn't bad. We laughed. I saw that theater. You guys, first of all, I'm just letting you guys know I'm 46. I'm telling you right, my parents loved that movie. They loved it. We will watch the movie.

And I remember as I got older, you know, I was like, one day I was like, huh? This is fucked up. Now, here's a deal. It's interesting that he would take a shot at Soul Man. We'll talk more about Soul Man later. Because even in Soul Man, the movie is attempting in a really, really fucked up way to make a commentary on a critique. on race. The movie is attempting

to lampoon someone that will go or make fun of somebody that will go that far and use something intended to help black people to help themselves. And the movie is an exploration about what that character kind of learns about black people

by doing this really stupid silly thing. But you just can't get past with the movie does. Man, I don't think you can find it. I don't think it's streaming. I can't imagine that's the case with the way that 4Ks and Blu-rays are now. Well, I'm sure, Sean probably We've got to find that. Sean's got this special

steel look at from New Zealand. Yeah. It's a big picture, a podcast about movies. Well, today we talk about soul made. St.

Thomas Hopkins. I vaguely remember what happens, but wasn't he got a scholarship at Harvard? But it turns out Ray Don Chong should have gotten the scholarship

and now she's putting herself through. He couldn't pay for it. Yeah. He couldn't pay for it. Howard Law School. But he took it from Ray Don Chang, right?

He got into Harvard. but he couldn't pay for it and for some reason his dad wouldn't pay because he didn't get a scholarship or something like that so he got he wanted to get the aid the money and he did blackface. Did you know about this movie Craig? Yeah, but I've never seen it. Just because we talked about it.

He took tanning pills. To tanning pills. To tanning pills. To get black. So Brandon T. Jackson said when I first read the script, I was like, what? Blackface? But when I saw him act, he became a black man. It was just good acting.

It was weird in the same. because he would keep going with the character as a method actor. I bet that was weird. Stiller said he's playing a method actor who's gone to great lengths to play a black guy. The movie is skewing actors and how they take themselves.

So seriously. And then last thing, Downey was so committed to it that he did the DVD commentary as the character instead of Robert Downey. All right. I would... Go ahead.

Go ahead. No, you go. I just think it's interesting that you could make the argument that he does not take himself seriously as an actor again. until Oppenheimer. Like, he does Iron Man,

I'm not saying he's not taking that seriously. Just go ahead and shit on this. He's largely, like, playing. Like, there is very few roles that he does in between this and... Like, he's playing the character of movie actor Robert Downey, just popping into movies.

And it's like... Like, the judges definitely like that. Almost wonder if he got, like, too close to the sun on this one. Now, I'll say this. I actually think that there are a couple of movies where he tries it. I think he tried it in the soloist.

I think he tried it in What's the one? The judge? And I just think he just got to a point To where to fit those movies into something That audiences were loving so much Yes He just went, I can't do it

Like I'm taking some swings I want to be Robert Downey Jr. to me Always wanted to be taken He's such a great fucking actor He wanted to be taken seriously As a serious actor Tony Stark was never going to be enough for him

But he also made insane amounts of money saying a amount of money. Getting while the getting was good. And even after this, right, he did Oppenheimer. He won. And then he goes back to the MCU. Because now that he's proven that thing to everyone, go back, get another.

70, 80, 100 million dollars. You know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah. I just, I don't know, man. I kind of feel like if he had just, if any, I'm trying to think of there's anybody else that would have been able to pull this off.

Because, really? I know. I was like, honestly thinking of the people who he's supposed to be lampooning. Yeah. And how bad it would have been if Russell Crow. If Russell Crow or Colin Farrell tried to do this, it would have just been like, we've got to burn the negative.

Colin Farrell, and we've been more black women than Robert Downey Jr. Colin Farrell, we got proof. You've been into it. But like, you can watch it. But I'll say this. When you think about it, that's actually a good point, like a fantastic point. Downey is one of the most unique talents. that has ever come out of the time.

Yeah. Yeah. Like, super unique. He can charisma his way through a movie. He can straight act his way through a movie. He can comedy his way through a movie. He's like, he's got a weird Hanksian thing. Not quite the everyman thing that Hanks has got going on. He can't get there. But he's got like a really, really deep skill set.

In my life, I didn't know that he had like a comedic background. Like, I didn't, I had not know until the city. He was a Saturday Night Live. Yeah. I mean, I had not know if that was his background. No, I mean, I think it's something, if you had probably gone back to like pre-C chaplain, before Chaplin, like less than zero, some of the stuff that he was doing in the 80s, you would probably be like, this is going to be Dustin Hoffman, right?

Like, this is going to be, this guy could do anything and might do a range of comedic and drama performances. So for him to take 15 years, almost 20, when we get to Doomsday, to be like, I'm going to basically play Tony Stark, a couple of, Sherlock Holmes movies, a couple throwaway kind of Hollywood dramas. Just trying to see if I can, try to see if I can bite the dramatic apple. I always think about, like, I mean, PTA is

debated about how real this was, but, like, he was supposed to be an inherent vice. He was supposed to play the detective that Joaquin Phoenix played. And I was always like, man, what would what would it have been like if Downey had done inherent vice and like a really challenging, cool movie with PTA?

And we'll just never know. And I don't know when he's going to try again. He does three Iron Man's And then once he's not in those He's made $10.000. After he's in those, he's in Spider-Man. He's in everything that they're doing. And the stuff he's doing other than that is basically Sherlock.

Yeah. So, 2020, it was interesting. Who was the one who pointed out that on Letterbox? This was like three and a half stars or something? Like this is a movie that some people are now against. Tropic Thunder? Tropic Thunder. I don't know.

I think it's like not. Were you the one that told me that? I thought it was like not well liked I said there's something about Mary has Or was it there's something about Mary It's something about Mary has like It's either five stars or one star I well I'm sure again

We'll probably get to this but Let's get to it now Well I just kind of feel like It didn't age quite as well as I thought I walked away feeling very underwhelmed But because of the movie Not because of like the mist the jokes don't land anymore Right

The movie itself by the character The character well because like again like In retrospect, I probably thought, Danny McBride and Nick Nolte probably made me laugh my ass off in 2008. But as I was watching it again, I watched it twice this weekend. I was just like,

it felt like there was missed opportunities all over the place. The movie depends so much on Robert Downey Jr.' Junior's performance to be a great movie. It's heroic. It's a low-bearing wall. I'll also say,

I didn't remember this before watching it this time around. The third act of this movie feels like they're making it up as they're going along. Like on the day of, they're kind of like, yeah, let's have a shootout over here. And it's like, oh, you guys kind of almost stopped writing the movie at a certain point.

I laughed my fucking ass off. Like, I laughed. I think when the war broke out, I was a saucier and sent a tone. I think that's a fucking scene. Back when the war broke out, ah. Columns the greens and some greens. I think, I don't know why. Like, even in the theater, when that was happening, I was like,

this is the funniest shit I've ever fucking seen. And then to watch Brandon, look at him like, what the fuck? This motherfucker's crazy. Like, that's the funny. I laughed at my ass. To your point, you get to a point in the movie almost at the point where they discover he's Simple Jack, where the movie is just almost like, unwatchable.

You can't like even watch it. But all the trailers, that part, everything that led up to there, I thought it was hysterical. I laughed big-ass titty's for no reason. It's funny. The movie's fucking hysterical to me. Yeah, I had that in one stage is the worst. The last third of the movie

could probably be half as long. Yeah. And it's clearly they're just shooting from the hip in Hawaii and just filming shit, blowing stuff up. Yeah, I mean, I was surprised that it wrapped up as quickly as it did. Like, all of a sudden, I see Tom Cruise just like, you know. He's dancing.

And I'm just like, oh, wait, this is how Yeah. The last five, six minutes of this is going to be. Okay, cool. Stiller directed, wrote the screenplay with Justin Thoreau and Eton Cohen. So Stoerter, Reality Bites, Cable Guy, Thunder, two Zoolanders, and Walter Middy, and then a bunch of severance, right? He's done severance and escaped from Danamora. Yeah.

Escape from Danora. Yeah. Great fucking show. Yeah. We fucking love that one. Great show. That could have gone longer. Let these guys stay free.

Let's run that back. They just make that again? Yeah. So they had an extensive marketing campaign, fake websites, fake stuff for the characters, fictional TV special, sold the energy drink. And then they did a simple jack website and people were like, get this fucking thing down. And that was that. They had multiple movie clips.

Even in 2008, people were like, no. No on the simple jack website. And to be real, there were protests then. Yeah. So I hope no one thinks that there weren't. Premier. They were protests then. They were protests from the black community.

They were protests from the Shriver family and the Special Olympics. There were protests then. There was talk about the less grossman character and whether or not that character was directly. They were protests then. It's just that the funny one. And that is what happened with the movie. People went to the movie. They were like, it's funny and the funny one.

Downey, best supporting actor, Nam. Unfortunately, it was the Heath Ledger Dark Night Year. So, let's play this out. How would that have worked if Robert Downey Jr. had won an Oscar for this? Over dead Heath Ledger? That would have been terrible. Just who had fucking gone crazy. Number one, the Heath Ledger performance is like...

He was never going to wait. I mean, just imagine... If it was a different year, you mean? Every year around the Oscars, there'd be tweets about how there's more people that won Oscars for... Oh, yeah, sorry. I'm new to the... No, no, no. He has a microphone brain blind spot.

We were doing it and used... UCLA, the mic is down here and Joel is talking. I'm like, Joe, there's people in the stands. It was like, what was that? SNL sketch with Bill Hader where he's the, he's the, he can't put all the off of it going on. It's got a podcast. I was not meant to be on camera in life.

I was a writer. I told him. I was like, yeah. You're a late bloomer superstar. So you were going to say, though, the Oscar thing. Oh, yeah. Every year around there, they'd be like, oh, a bunch of black people saying there's been more people that have won Oscars for Blackface and have actually

You know, won't. It's not the craziest fucking thing in the world that he got an Oscar nomination for this? Like, if you tell somebody now that he got an Oscar nomination for that, it would blow their mind. I think the Oscar nomination is the thing that people most hold on to when they're talking about the negative legacy of the portrayal.

Yes. Is the fact that he got nominated? It hurt the movie almost that he got an Oscar. Yeah. You know what else is interesting about it? We talked about this with there's something about Mary. Like, comedy has never got nominations. Yes.

That's right. And it was just weird that this one. It was like all the old white people and the Oscars were like, yeah. But this goes back to my theory that sometimes the people in the Oscars be fucking with us.

It's like sometimes they go, they sit together and they watch the help and they go, yeah, we're going to piss them off. I don't even, like the blind side? Oh,

we got to make sure they get one here. I would like to think it was trolling, but I think it's actually just old guys, you know? They'd be like the shit was just better back then. Driving Miss Daisy. Oh, that's when we got one. You know what I'm saying?

So I just think something they fucking win us sometimes, man. This was weird that it got nominated. Less for the Downing character, but just the comedy getting that... It's not like this was a hit, but not like a phenomenon. Yeah, it's a pretty hard...

To me, it would have made more sense for Matt Dillon to get nominated for there's something about Mary or something like that. So Marissa Tomey and my cousin, who else... It's it. It's not a long list. She's great, yeah. Craigel.

Google, Google, Google comedy, actor, actress, supporting Oscar. If you're talking last 30 years, it's probably five or less. Would you count raw too well? Oh. No, that's kind of like... That's a great character.

I don't think that's a great character. But it's not like necessarily like a comedy character. He has funny scenes, but I don't even think that they're being... They're very much like rooted in the story of Jerry McInty. Melissa McCarthy, bridesmaids, nominations. Okay, yeah, that's one. Gosselin Barbie, that's one. Gosselin Barbie, that's one.

That's one. Jonah Hill, Wolf of Wall Street. I don't get that fucking shit out of here Wow All right relax Yeah Yeah that's it He made of sad

He stopped researching Tutsi Terry Gar I mean that was in the 80s Yeah we had a couple on the 80s Yeah it's pretty rare Speaking of Craig This movie was 107 minutes A plus 7 on the Horlebeck scale

Feels like a plus 14 I have you I mean there's trailers at the beginning you know, there's some bonus footage that they had to include. The unrated director's cut, which for some reason I own on Voodoo, was like over two hours. Really? Yeah. What's in there?

Just extra stuff. As you know, Craig, my rule is always deleted scenes. We're deleted for a reason. And that's a good example. $90 million budget made $195.7 million. Roger Ebert. Three and a half stars. Considerably better than Stilers' previous film, Zoolander.

Wow. except you didn't like Zoolander. It's the kind of summer comedy that rolls in makes a lot of people laugh and rolls on to video. Most rewatchable scene. Let's go. Categories. I fucking love the opening so much.

I think the first 25 minutes of this movie are A plus plus plus plus. The excess Hollywood segment was just great. You're jumping ahead. Isn't that the first 25 minutes? No. Oh. No, I have the opening.

Okay. Oh, you're talking about just the trailers. The trailers. The trailer. Booty sweat. Booty sweat. Scorchers Six Global Meltdown, the fatties far too, and Satan alley. The movie hasn't even started yet.

That's right. That's right. And, you know, it's probably a very complicated time for Kirk Lazarus, because he's also on the trail for Satan's Alley. Right. He's got to do promotion. That's right. For mid-11 in the 12th century. Because he, because Tubby McGuire is nominated.

Now, does Kurt Lazarus, who is very competitive, did he get nominated? Well, I think after the Tropic Thunder experience, he's realized it's not about competition. It's not about competition. He's only five. First big battle scene. Tug get shot like 47 times.

His hands are blown into spiders. Dan McBride comes in hot. Mother Nature just pissed her pants suit. There's a lot of good stuff in there. I like his hands. And the Jay Barrishel, the intestines kill me. Oh, man. What even is all this?

I think I can put it back. I think I can put it. it back killed me. The E.T. Segment is the NeNeNebri goes, Tuck, and Kim have blue balls. I want to let him escort it. E.T. Segment with Nunoz.

The disappointing buddy comedy, Chitlin and the dude. I was going to ask. So what was the premise of this movie? Who was Chitlin and who was the dude? I think Chitlin was... Martin Lawrence? No, that was Martin Lawrence.

Yeah. So Chitlin was... Oh, man. And then the dude was Ben Stowe or Tug Speedman and Drag? Yeah. The art of parody. What was he Chitlin? I had so many questions for Chitlin and the dude

I wanted to know more The art of parody Parity just works better than Because the name of the movie Chitlin and a dude man It's a buddy cop cop It's a movie they would never make But it's a movie that they made

Yeah they just call it something else But it's really chitlin and the dude They call it like money talks Yeah Well they had What was the Benvereen comedy that on TV It was like 10 Speed and Brow Brown shoe, something like that.

But that was like an actual show. You can look it up. It's on ABC for multiple years. Simple Jackson, this as well. And then we get to meet McConaughey, whose hair is just, I don't know what's going on. It's blowing. It is like a full-fledged afro. Yeah.

He looks great, man. Yeah, I don't know if it's a wig or what he's doing. I think that was maybe post a turkey visit. Post-Harrisans. Yeah. We get less gross. entrance. This is your fault, you limey fuck.

Oh, my favorite. One of my favorites. Hey, where's the key grip? Punch him in the face. Because the key grip is going to look the same on every production. We get Damien, the director, blowing up. I got to say, this is a guilty pleasure of favorite scene for me because I like when he puts the head on the rifle. So good. Oh, yeah. Let's go and make the greatest wall movie ever.

Boom. It's cord syrup, guys. Latex and corn syrup. then the scene, I don't even know how to title this scene, but the, Tug and Kirk talk about Simple Jack. Can we talk about the scene real quick?

I'll just lay it out. Okay, talk about the scene real quick. Okay, so obviously the scene is hugely and ridiculously problematic, obviously, right? Is it? I'll tell you, it is just because, in the world that we want to live in, it is, right?

However, the observation in the scene. However, I laughed for three straight minutes. Yes, the observation in the scene was so deadly accurate. And even still, I wonder when I watch it, how I never thought of that.

Sean Penn blew it. The observation in the scene is so deadly accurate that it is a genius, brilliant piece of comedy writing. It is. You can't take it away from people who look at that and go, you don't want that as part of a punch.

line and all of that stuff like that. I get it. That scene is hysterical and it's just gorgeous writing. It's the most memorable line from the movie. This is the most rewatchable scene for me. It's also basically the sleep with me Quentin Tarantino rant about

Top Gun. It's like the most dead on observation about like it looks charted, exited, not retarded. And like the fact that like that like that actually is the peak of Downey's performance to me is like he's just so, he is pretending

to be an Australian guy, pretending to be a black guy who's also commenting on the nature of Oscar campaigns. Well, also, the way he plays off Stiller, Stoer's like, there were times, I actually felt like I became retired in town.

He's like, what the fuck? But he's also, and all of that, he's also fucking with him. Yeah. They're in a dick measuring contest for the starring role with this movie. So he's saying,

you're a moron. You're like, moronical. And Ben is going, yeah. Like the dumbest motherfucker. Dumbus motherfucker. He's really, and then he gives him a little bit,

he walks, he makes him follow, and he just continues to fuck with him the entire time. He does the same thing when he's commenting on his physique and he's like, any tips?

Any tips? I'm trying to come up too. I'm telling him. He's got to fuck too. I don't give a fuck what nobody say. He is throwing 117 miles an hour for the entire movie, and it still tickled me to this day. A couple more.

We get a couple less Grossman scenes, including the ransom meeting. Take a big step back. Didn't really fuck your own face. Him dancing on Flo Rider. Was it good at Flo Rider back, guys? You like them. It was fun. It was a very 2007-8-ish.

I don't, you know, I don't know if I've ever been any place that played flowrider, man. Oh, interesting. Have you? Well, like, LSU. Like, I was, I would go home. I wasn't, I was in, fucking L.A. by this time,

but you go home, you go around the campus, and they love low, L.R.on campus. A lot of my high school prom. Yeah. Really? Yeah, I think it was.

I got to avoid a lot of it. I was 30 years old. Yeah, I was close to that in age, too, but you're like, you go back, you go on campus, and they play, oh, Apple Bottom Jee, and Booz. Forgot to mention Tug getting recognized

as Simple Jack. Yes. and they all bathe the VHS. I think this is a top three for me. The troops all hanging out when Jack Black is tied up. When he calls, he says your mother's a contentious horror. Oh, when Jeff's detoxing?

And the Lance, he's talking, Brandon T. Rob, he's talking about Lance. Yeah. And we get, where you think of the dangling the dice on Lance's forehead? I texted that to Craig this weekend Do you think they always knew that that was going to be Lance Bass? That's a really good question. That probably was a late. Or they shot the Oscars already and they were like,

Lance, it's a funny joke, it'll pay off at the end. Downey says, man, everyone's gay once in a while. It's Hollywood. And then Jack Black wants to blow him if I feel untired. All crater the ball, stroke the shaft, worked the pipes. Swallowed the gravy. Get it over here, buddy. Let's do this. Can I do my flex right now?

Because it's related to that line. Yeah, let's go. It's the Stephen Seagal, shitting on himself, word for the most unbelievable anecdote from the actual film shoot. Apparently, that line that Jack Black says, tied to that tree,

this is from an interview with Jack Black. It was an homage to the urban legend about Sylvester Stallone going to his trailer with some lady. They were having sex in his trailer, and as the legend goes, he still wore his microphone, and the sound guy turned up the volume

and everybody outside could hear. And he was saying, stroke the shaft, cradle the ball, say my name, small the gravy. What? I forgot about it. I think that is a true story. That's crazy.

Wow. If I'd have that context, it would have been that much funny. Yeah. Cradle the balls. The shootout. Jack Black with the double cocaine hands kills me. I like when the hands come back.

I like this. I have a sudden now half squat. As we said, the last third of this. This movie is not awesome, but there's a couple of fun things in there. And then the Oscars ending with Tropic Blunder and Less Dancing. So what do you got, Joel? What's your most rewatchable scene?

Well, actually, I gave it away already. I felt like the excess Hollywood scene just took me back to... If I felt like I was... I am in a hotel room right now. Yeah. Right? I'm staying in a hotel room because LA's not where I live. And it was just like sitting down, putting down your shit and being like, oh, yeah, this is exactly what I would expect it to see.

Yeah, it's like sitting in an airport bar. Yeah. Yeah, on any TV from, like, 2003 to 2011. Yeah. You know? And it just felt good like that to me. I don't know. And somebody said, you know, I didn't see that...

Somebody said they were close to me, line coming? Y'all don't know. I felt like that was the best acting that Benzterling done in the whole thing. Somebody said they were close to me? Yeah. What do you got, Van? Kirk and Tug. So I'll see it in San Antonio, man.

I'm sorry, guys. Like, it's... Oh, when he's talking about cooking for them? Yeah. He's like, we're going to sit down. And he just... And there's something that happens in that scene First of all, Brent...

What you say? Huzzle up some crawl. So I actually called Brandon about this. And Brandon said that they were losing the light. And now you can actually see it when you see it. They were losing the light. And Ben Stiller told them, just do whatever. Just cook.

Like, it was all improv. This movie has a lot of that kind of like Ghostbusters feel. When we were talking about Ghostbusters, it was all improv. They were losing the light. Ben was getting cranky. And he's like, you guys just cook. Just do some shit. And so Robert comes off the top of his head with that.

He starts going in on it, and Brandon T. Jackson just plays off of him. And the authenticity of it, it plays real to me. Because when I'm listening to him, be a black man to talk about crawled ads and, like, grab some collard greens and all. It's just his, it's fucking unbelievably hilarious. It's hilarious to me. Did he say collared up some? Collared up some green.

He said, he says, y'all in for it. treat. Back before the war broke, I was a saucy hand so. Salat him. Call up some of these greens. It's funny, bro. This shit is funny. What do you have, Sierra? I'm going to go with Kirk and Tug talking about Simple Jack. That's mine as well. That's the...

What's the most 2008 thing about this movie? I got a list. Rick Peck playing Wii tennis. That's one? Wee's on there. Oh, the Wii. Yeah, I get the Wii. Toby McGuire being credited as an MTV Best Kiss Award winner. That's on there.

Less reading Maxim Magazine. That's on there. Marine Menunoo's entire banks. TiVo. The entire conversation about the format wars between HD DVD and Blu-ray. And how far and led the way? Hop one led the way.

An important Lance Bass cameo. Qualcomm phones. But the winner is TiVo. And the winner really is TiVo, saving everybody at the end. It feels like the most dated fucking thing ever. Yeah. Were you a TiVo monthly subscriber or lifetime?

I never had TiVo. What? No, I didn't really get it until DVR on tableboxes. What did y'all do? I had it. 50,000. I loved it. By the time I started fucking with it,

your provider had the shit on it. Also, sometimes we would literally go to like, I would go to a friend's house to watch 24 on TiVo. Like, I got three 24s. Tebow really at a moment. Yeah. Yeah. It was like the most important thing in my house once in a one time.

Yeah. What stage the best? A couple of things. The Spalding official NBA ball is in there. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's 2000A. The original iPod is in there. Oh, shit, you're right.

The original iPod is in there. The first one, yeah, that's the first year. God, the Xbox was in there. They were so good. There's also, while he's, because it's, it's, Tug is watching his iPod in the jungle, right? Yeah. He pulls out a very specific brand of chapstick that is, like, only from 2008. that he's about to put on before the pan attacks him.

And one thing about this, too, last thing I'll say about 2008, everybody in this movie is in the perfect spot in their career to be in this movie. For like the space of it. They're all big, but they're a little dinged up.

Yep. Yep. Perfect. Stiller's the only one who's... But even he, I guess, who's a kind of bit ding-up. It's not like... It's a $600 million movie. This is just his project, though. So it's not, you know, he's already kind of had his run. Right.

What stage is the best? I have a list, but what do you got, Joel? I said the portrayal of Les Grossman. Oh, shit. You know what I'm saying? Like, don't you think of him, like, that is our CEO class in this country. Sure. You know what I mean?

And like he put, for what, even though people think that there was some anti-Semitic tropes with that, I didn't read that. I didn't get that out of that. That may be my own ignorance on it or whatever. But I just thought that kind of executive has defined American culture as much as any one of the past 20 years. Your response. Go ahead. Go ahead, Van. He doesn't give a shit if people die.

He doesn't have to treat you nice. He's ridiculous. Like, he'll make you watch him. You ask, why are you asking? You should be asking him. What is he saying? And in the appropriate amount of time, we will file an insurance claim.

I think that's actually true. It's a performance that, like, honestly, in 08, you were probably like, huh. And then now it's like, oh, it's completely on the nose for that era of Hollywood exact. For sure. What do you have for what stage the best? The whole scene with his exploded hands

and the two of them trying to crying on each other and Ben Still are still trying to cut the arrogance of those guys and just putting Danny McBride in charge of explosives. Fantastic. YouTube. They mentioned YouTube. YouTube was still kind of... Yeah.

It's like two years in. That's age the best. Also, all of these guys are kind of still on top. Yeah, like, Matt Jack Black's the biggest one out of all of them. Jack Black, Matthew McConaughey, Tom Cruise is back, Ben Stiller has Severance

and the Knicks. Like, he is like, a lot of these guys, Robert Donnie Jr., these guys are like still on top. Let me ask you about your boy, though. What's Brandon doing right now? He's doing great. Okay. So all the brother, you know what I mean,

you should tell the truth about he's doing your friend's experience, man. He's doing great. Brandon's doing great. I talk to him. He's doing great. He said, watch deadline is. He's doing great.

He's had a great career and it's still going on. I don't know why you're picking on. Just glad Vann was able to do a name drop. Been a couple episodes. I called Brandon earlier. I could drop more. You know the people,

you talked about, don't get used. You don't do it. If somebody else could do that, you can't do that. You got to start just name dropping like, be like, yeah, I was texting with Matt Dillon the other day. I just see if he calls you on it.

Like, yeah. You can't do that. A lot of people can do that, but not you. Look at you're doing a LeBron meme. I have a Vietnam movie parodies. I still enjoy even all these years later, even though they don't really make Vietnam movies anymore. But I still love that whole culture.

We even did a podcast about them once. Sandusky's theory about porno movies validating video formats? I thought it was, honestly, kind of brilliant. I was thinking about this the other day because we were doing a physical media pod on Big Picture, and we were to ask the question about whether or not there will ever be something above 4K and the first thing that popped into my mind

was from this movie. It was like, well, if porn leads the way, then yes. It's going to be 8K, right? Craig? Apparently the human eye can't process more than 4K. I'm barely can process 4K. How about an author lying about a personal experience to sell books?

Yeah, that seems pretty well. See that's right. James Frey? James Frey. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is a personal one for me and it's so stealth, but It fucking kills me.

Rick, Rick Peck's loser's son. Oh, man. He has the picture of him. They had the picture. Thing he has in his office in the sunset. He's looking at the camera. Oh, but when they're on the plane,

at the end of the movie, too. I was like, oh, shit. This is so good. I have Peck's remedy for killing a hooker. For how to clean it up. Get your hands on some bleach, hydrogen peroxide, and a shitload of lime. I thought it was a great little kid performance by the leader of the Flaming Dragons. That guy's good.

He's really good. Yeah, he was excellent. He was like scary. He could do moves. And then I like when Nolte says, let's bag and tag the bastard. You're in a world of hurt. That's funny. Let's tag the bastard.

The bastard. It looks like, you're in the world that hurt. I don't know what I'm. CR said about the self-ex after game seven. It's like, let's bag and tag the master. He's talking to Tate him. And then,

oh my God. So, hmm, the five actors nominated for best actor leading role were Tug Speedman, Tom Hanks, Sean Penn, Toby McGuire,

and John Voight. Pretty believable. Yeah. Five-some. Yes. And you have to presume that Sean Penn consented to be

included in that group, yeah. Probably Downing, because he knew Downing from early. Okay. the Floyd Gondali butter on my ass and lollipops

in my mouth award for something I just enjoy Every time somebody says booty sweat man, it does shit work for me, bro I mean I was saying, you know, that was a time when people would say, I'm rich James bitch or whatever We don't boys just talk about booty sweat You know what I'm saying? Let me get some of that booty sweat Honestly

Don't see don't don't do that Don't do it I saw your face Anytime sympathy for the devil is used in a movie I'm just kind of like my spidey senses go off Yeah I did a deal I was gonna wonder

I was going to do the hottest take on whether that's the best movie song of all time, but it wasn't less movies than I thought. Focus was the big one. It uses it a lot. Yeah. But more TV shows. I really love well-done fake movie trailers and a movie.

It's a fucking home run every time. Like I honestly, I feel like we're short. Craig, we're like 50 short career. Fake movie trailers? It's just really well-done ones. Just throwing, like, why not just if you're making a comedy, why not just put a fake movie trailer for no reason before? the movie starts.

They'll do more than the second season of the studio because the Paul Dano action movie that they did, which is really just the opening scene of that movie or the climax of that movie. And they did the one about the... Did they ever do the Greta Gerwig? Yeah, the Greta Gourkewarm. They did the one of the guys like the Sarah Polyme.

The Fartpocalypse. Didn't they do that trailer in the studio? With Johnny Knoxville? Oh, that's right. Yeah. That's right. I miss those. What do you have, Van?

Do you have one? I like walking around the jungle. I was like movies in the jungle. army action movies just walking around in the junk. Being scared. Yeah, being scared. All right, we'll take a break and then we'll come

back with Joel's first ever flex. All right, Joel, it's time. Your flex category. First, did you understand the assignment? I did understand the assignment. And actually, I had something for all three. And now I'm going to decide right here based on the center of the conversation.

Oh. All right. Because, you know, sometimes, because either it's like I could have done something more ridiculous, but also I don't want to see him. You know, this is a very high-brow podcast. Sure. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. It's a lot of intellectual heft here. It's not in my house, but we're still doing. Not at the house, not with the catering and everything.

Wow, Bill Sugarfish. Thanks, man. Tell your chef, thanks. Maybe the next time. The needle drop, run through the jungle by Creedens Clearwater Revival. Yeah, that shit is beautiful. Like, and I expect to hear it in every very very, Vietnam era movie. You're right. It's probably 80% of the Vietnam movies feel like they have to do it. Yeah. There's Creedons. Why wasn't there more

classic rock songs about jungles? I mean, I just in general I think Creightens has that vibe. So like Susie Q's in Apocalypse Now and I'm sure there's one. I think the number one Vietnam movie band. They have to be right? Yeah. You hear the music. Fortune Sun is in every scene.

The Sun is in every scene. One of them. Yeah. And then there's a lot of Motown. What's the most used song in a Vietnam movie? probably anything from Creedon's Clearwater revival. I think it's fortunate son. It's the most stereotypical song. Allegedly, they say that song is about gun violence,

which is crazy because this is from like 1969. Yeah. Yeah. I was like, it said, really wasn't about Vietnam, huh? Okay, sure. Whatever you say. But yeah, that was my shit. I mean, I actually downloaded that so I could listen to it. Oh, yeah. Great Chat Gordo, where tug running in front of the bridge as it blows up,

or would you do something else? I had the Great Shot Gordo slash the Sean Fennacy Award for Stoth Omage that gives every movie NERTER, Criterio Orgasm, is the reenactment of the Willem Defoe Death and the Tateau. Were you to do Platoon? It's on the list. Fucked that movie.

Chess Rockwell, Brocklander's a word for best character name. It's got to be Alpo Chino. Alpo Chino. Kirk Lazarus is good, too. My silver medal is actually Hater's character is named Rob Slalom. I don't know if I ever actually say it out loud.

But it's so weird to watch Hater because you keep waiting for him to completely break out in this movie and he's just like kind of keeping it. Now, if you count Lincoln Osiris is the name. Yes. That's a good one. Link.

Yeah. The Kid Cutty pursued a happiness. Joel talked about the needle drop. There's a couple really good ones in there, but it's got to go to credits. For what it's worth is also another big Vietnam movie one. What do you got for your flex? I have Billy Bats, Jack Wolts Award

for the most biting and scalable insult for first of all, take a big step back and literally fuck your own face. It's a great one. Butch's girlfriend word, weak link of the film. This is a really, this is a good one here. I think this is interesting. Mine is, we already discussed it.

I thought the last third could have been seven, eight minutes tighter, and we just could have gotten out of their face. Even halfway through, I was like, man, this is kind of going on. Yeah. You know? I wanted more, like, in the, there's a deleted scene before they send the five into the jungle

again where they're at some party at the set and they're talking to Apocino Barrichelle meets him and I just wanted like two more scenes with that like the guys hanging out before it got weird and less at the back end would be my note I have Jack Black Wow

You thought he just showed up and collected a check No I think that the Jack Black stuff is funny at times but I do think that Beyond the scene of, there are two scenes that really were. Other than that, he's kind of just whacked out in the movie and pulling it away from the funniest parts, which is like Kurt and Tug and Al Pacino and some of the other stuff.

I had Jack Black, and it's rare. Jack Black is normally a plus player in every movie he's in. But in this one, I had him as the weakly. I have, Steve Coogan is much funnier in Raines of Madness than he is in Tropic Thunder. Yeah. And I feel like they kind of hemmed him in a little bit. I'm Ben Stiller, man.

I was just not... Yeah, I was... Ben Stiller? Wow. Yeah, man. I'm sorry. I just, again, I felt like, I was like, oh, I've seen this Ben Stiller before over and over again.

I didn't think he had that much work to do. I felt like he got to be himself. And, you know, I mean, I didn't mean that he was bad. And I didn't think... I think the acting performances were probably some of the best parts of the movie to me. And of that bunch, I thought I would have said Jack Black, but I couldn't say Jack Black

because you already said Jack Black. So I had Ben Stiller, like, right above that. I get what Joel saying. I think we were talking about this a little bit earlier. Like, Ben Stiller has really good taste, and usually the movies he's involved in are really good and funny. But he's not always, like, the single best part of the movie as just particularly an actor.

But there's something that he can do that is very useful in a movie like this, is he can be a funny straight man. Yes, and he's making fun of himself. He's making fun of himself. and his performances are nuanced enough to where he can be the straight man to a lot of other stuff

that is crazy and happening at the same time in the movie. But he can also actually have you laugh at him. I enjoy him more as a character actor. Like, I think him and Happy Gilmore or even Zoolander is funnier than when he's just doing like the meet the parents thing. Yeah.

The Steven Segal shitting on himself a word for most unbelievable anecdote from the actual film shoot, which Craig already did. I have another one. This is Bill Hater. This is the story he had. Tom Cruise didn't know who I was and was trying to figure it out. I said, Seth Rogen's a friend of mine.

He said he went to your house. I did a Seth Rogen impersonation for two seconds. Like, Tom Cruise is amazing. We rode motorcycles in his backyard. And it was like, I did a magic trick. Tom Cruise started clapping and going crazy. And he went, you do impressions and you're on Saturday Live. Meaning I was briefed that I know who you are.

I just sort of love to have been in the room for this. Yeah. But can you imagine Cruz doing the over-exaggerated? You're so funny. You're the SNL guy. Oh, I get it. It's kind of like the politician

who's just like, this is the Treasury Secretary and that's his daughter. He's been on SNL for two years. What stage is the worst? Well, we covered a lot of the what's age the worst already, including the website for Simple Jack

all of the other things that happen. Any other what's age of the worst that we have? I would probably say it's just a, I would say the action in this movie is each the worst. Okay. Yeah. I would say that comedy is not the only thing that matters now anymore.

Your movie is not just about whether or not it's funny. This is like really one of the last movies that was like, okay, it's going to take all of these chances, these gigantic swings. And if it's funny, it's going to work. Your shit can't just be funny now. It has to, there has to be more than that. You have to consider a lot of things before you put script to screen and then put it out. or else people go not fuck what they're going to summon it before you even gets to the theater. Unless you're a standup.

If you're a standup, it can still work. But even as a standup, though, you have this almost sectioned off group of people who just came to see you. The movies, I think people react differently to them because they, I don't know why people still feel like that every movie is supposed to be for everyone. They don't feel like that way about stand-ups. It's almost like if you go to see Lewis C.K. at this point, you know what you signed up for. But when a movie comes out, a lot of times people are offended because they feel like if it's in the theater, I'm supposed to be able to watch it. Yeah, and I think also it's just like you've been selling me this movie for such a long time and it either is or isn't what I expected it to be. For a movie to get made like 100 people who have to sign off on it, Louis, it's kind of just him.

Any wood stage is the worst show? Do you have any what stage is the worst for us or did we cover everything? Oh, no, I was going to say, I thought the comedy just fell flat. It's total. Like, it wasn't as funny as I remember. I just, I thought, see, a rare case. of Joel Tramethander I don't like this movie

Yeah He came on this podcast No he did the work though Yeah I did I just you know again I watched it again I think I definitely remember thinking it was funnier

In 2000 Can we actually Because this is Joel's first time On the podcast Can we get a barometer Of what would be a funny movie To you Exactly

Oh Well I mean my favorite movie Is coming to America Friday Okay Funny You know what else I love I always talk about

Welcome Home Rosco Jenkins Because nobody I know I've been here any fuck with it, but Yeah. Okay. You ever see that one? You've seen what?

Bar Morsko Jenkins. 2000s? Something like that. Yeah. Early. Early 2000. He goes back to his family reunion. And, yeah,

there's in Shreveport. Yeah. It's 2008? 2008. See, 2008? I like stuff. I believe you do. I believe to let.

I like the laugh. But I didn't know if you were going to be like, to me Rushmore is funny, you know? Yeah. I mean, I like a lot of the, um, I was like the best in show. Yeah. Like that kind of.

Yeah. Christopher guest stuff. Yeah, I love this stuff. You know, this one just, and look, I like Anchorman. Like, Anchorman's like a stepbrothers. I could, if you put Step Brothers on right now, I will not get that. We got the idea. Okay.

You know, we... I'm just fast-thirty-thirty, all the people are like, why'd you have the guy that's like traffic thunder on the rewatchable? But, you know, we had this conversation with about, with something about Mary, about its legacy. This is a complicated movie. Beyond its legacy beyond just, like, whether it was funny or not, right? And you just mentioned two movies.

that I feel like have a way bigger like sort of mind share of like the current movie going public. Anchorman and Step Brothers are way bigger than Tropic Thunder. I also think they're better movies. I think that I think they have a much longer tale. Okay. But I'll also say there's a reason why

because those movies edit for television better. There's another reason. Like my kids didn't like Tropic Thunder try to shock by. I get it. It's an edgy. It's a satire of like 19. They were just out.

But they fucking love Anchorman and Stepbrother. Those movies are more, I mean, there's some, you know, but those movies edit for television better than those are more accessible films. Outside of Downey, did you think, I mean, I'm not, I don't, you know, people are going to get mad at me, but that's fine. Did you think it outside of Downey, did it seem like smart funny to you though? Like, you were just like, oh wow, that was some really complicated humor. You really thought. I thought that the complete of the first, like, hour of the movie and especially like the trailers, the Maria Menuno's section, Pac and Grossman. Like, all that first bit run through the Hollywood stuff is pretty.

She's funny. At the end of it, she goes, lo, lo, lo, lo, something like that. She's funny. All of that stuff leading up to it, to me, is really, really high-level satire. We're going on. Ruffalo Hannah Rubinich Perchage overacting word.

I had Jack Black. Yeah. Van's Choice for a Flex. Okay. A list. Five movies not getting greenlit in 2026. Number five, our namesake movie, The Ringer.

Have you ever seen this? Yeah, that was problematic when it. That's Johnny Knoxville, right? Johnny Knoxville. We had a big debate about whether we named the ring or the ringer, wondering if the ringer, the movie would overshadow us with Google. And guess what, it did not? I almost cost you so much money by calling the website Chase the Night.

Yeah, almost there. We tried for two years, Chris. I got to pull the plug. Yeah, seriously. These are five movies we're not making. Number four, Tropic Thunder. I don't know if with all the stuff like that, the movie intact the way it is, it gets greenlit today.

I don't know if they make it. Number three, Juana man. We, oh, man. Not going to happen. You're not in this day and age going to have a movie where a guy goes and dominates

the W IBA because he's a guy. We're having too many conversations. The W is coming too far. It's not going to happen. That's right. Number two, I think, is could easily be number one. It's an easy one.

The birth of a nation. Like the new birth of a nation. Bro, I know. The second one. The 1915 birth of a nation? Yeah, we're not doing that right now. I think that would have been the case. They played it in the White House.

All right, people were happy to go see it. All right, so I would have to say right now. That's because they were like, I can't believe a train is moving, right? That is partly true. It's also because they was fucking with that shit. Well, you're saying, I mean, they might, I mean, they might, I mean, that might go over there. There might be a 4k or two sitting around in the White House now. Might.

Number one, despite the fact that we have tried on this podcast to change the legacy of this movie, there's no way SoulMan happens in 2026. Soul Man is an impossible. It's lack of availability. It's probably a testifying. So Soul Man is number one. I think Soul Man would cause a riot. Who's going to be writing?

I think all people riot. Do you think it with? Because actually, I mean, ultimately, the guy finds out that racism is a real thing. Do you think of because of that? The people are like, what, you know? We can't get to that point. I'm trying to say that we can't get to that point

At the end of Soul Man, Soulman rounds out with him discovering just how terrible it is. But see Thomas Howe the entire movie has, it's just not going to happen. I would like to throw in the crying game into this talk. Interesting. I think people would fucking lose their minds now. They would have intentionally spoiled the secret. I think that movie gets sub-marined and annihilated. It's actually a good one.

Yeah. People would have been really mad at that movie. I'm trying to make, like, just on twists alone. I mean, I know why you're saying crying game, but I wonder whether or not, if you tried to pitch Fight Club now, would they just be like, yeah, but we're not going to be able to keep it a secret? Like, there's just too many people writing about movies.

There's too many people who see movies too early. And they'll be like, make sure you stick around for the last 20 minutes of this, you know? Like, yo, really tough. What a profile. Have we lost, would Fight Club not work today? The ability to keep a secret we've lost. Blair Witch is dead.

No way. Doesn't work. Like, Fight Club completely does not work in any way as a movie or as an experience. I remember when my homies was first putting me on Fight Club because I didn't see in the theaters. They were happy to not spoil it. They would tell you everybody.

I can't tell you what's going on. And they just made you, I don't know if that would exist now. It would be all over. Kind of like what they did with the drama almost. I love Fight Club. American History Acts? They could still make that one. I think that one could still get made.

Okay. The CR thinks Luke Wilson could have been Harrison Ford. How does take a word? What do you have CR? This movie did to Platoon what Walk Hard did to music biographies. Ooh. I tried watching Platoon this weekend. I need a little bit more distance from Tropic Thunder to like watch Keith David.

Yeah. Like, we're going home, brother. You know, like, it's just too close. And all the shots that they had, like, there's so many one-for-one shots from, like, Platoon in Tropic Thunder. So I think it kind of deflated the ball a little bit. My hottest thing is this is legitimately the only time I have purely and sincerely. not even a half of percent at all been offended by black guys. This looks bad.

I'm like, I'm delayed guys, no, I know that this looks bad. I just, I want to, I want to have been offended by that in this movie more. I want to be, like, I'm, I, I interrogate myself, but as many times as I've watched it, as many times as I've seen it, I just have never even a little bit. been offended by the usage of it in this. There's no blackface. If you do it, I'm going to get on your motherfucking ass. Stop with the goddamn Halloween costumes. It's not a tribute to Beyonce.

I can't, like, all of that stuff. But in this movie, for whatever reason, it's just never offended me. Oh, that's some real shit. I actually agree with him. It does not, it had to be as good as it was for it to meet that bar. And I'm just going to tell, like, all right, I'm going to give Lincoln Osiris a chance. It's also like, if he had been doing it. like if he had been doing anything that was like contemporary like if he tried to kick hip hop

language in it or anything like that it would just blown up in his face so when he did the sauté and sent and tone thing that's why they had brandon's character go right back because like okay you're leaning into the shit you're well now you're too many times in between takes but that was the joke all the time the joke was what do you mean you people like they continuously remind you over and over and over thing, that the absurdity of this is that people take roles like this. The absurdity is that this is not so far out of the realm of what has happened or what did happen.

So I don't know. I just got it. What do you have? That was it. I mean, I actually, I'm not offended by the blackface at all. And again, I thought, you don't have the hottest take? That performance was.

That's not your hottest take. What's that? Do you have a hottest take? That's the hottest take. Yes. Oh, you both had the, you separately came to the same hotest take. Not offended by the black face at all because I get, I think, this is my first time in front of watching those audience, right?

And there's a lot of people on Reddit or whatever. It's like, oh, that guy's a joke. Let's go. But anyway, I can laugh. I can't shit like that. You know what I mean? I think that's fine. Oh, they're going to love you.

If you're going to be racist, like at least be funny with your shit, dog. And, like, I felt like, be correct. I mean, I'm not even going to talk about some of the shit I like on Twitter sometimes. I'm just like, oh, man, you know, sometimes Nick Fuentes. Oh, no. I said some shit. I'm like, I don't fuck with you. I don't like you.

We would never be cool. But I was like, that was kind of funny, though, dog. Do you want me to try and get out of this? Let's do it. Let's do how would Van get out of this one right now? Should we do it like a top ten blackface? You don't think Nick Flint is funny? Get the fuck out of my face with that.

You said it before. Shut up, dog. I'm like, I never wish we were live on Netflix for. I'm going to try to follow that one. My hottest take, I think you can switch four actors to parts of this and it's a better movie. Oh, I think you could switch McConaughey and Stiller,

and I think you can switch Jack Black and Bill Hader, and I think the movie's better. So Stiller went in that Tom Cruise. So Stewart is the agent. Yeah, and the Tom Cruise oral history. Yeah, he was going to play the agent. And I think McConaughey is the lead, I think would have been really fun.

My issue with this is it feels very zoolandery, the character. It feels like a stiller character I've seen before. He's just like more jacked. Whereas McConaughey, I would have been interested. But I think Hater and the Jack Black part

when it was like, we hadn't really had Hater yet. We'd had Jack Black around for like 12 years at that point. I think Hater just would have added some improv stuff. I just think it would have been better. If you switch McCona Hay out of Peck, though,

you don't get rum-tum-tubber nuts. It's Becker. What do you think? Did I break your brain with that, Craig? McConaug as Tug, I think, really works. Hater, the physicality that Jack Black brings, I do think, like, add some sparkle to the movie when it's just them walking through the jungle for like an hour.

Jack Black does kind of bring that Farley energy that I do think kind of unique. Casting What Ifs, Stiller wanted Kianu as Tug didn't happen. Really? He was going to play Rick Peck and Kiang. Heanu's going to be tug. Keanu's tug is, I don't know. I don't know if that one would have worked. It's really,

Keanu might be one of the hardest actors to, like, assign roles to like this. Right. It's, it's, like, you talk about, like, Robert Donnie Jr. spending 15 years playing Iron Man. Like, I feel like Keanu's been John Wick for, like, 15 years. I think it was, like, 2014 or 13.

Yeah. Yeah, he's in that Aziz movie as an angel or whatever, and I was, I just seen as John. Yeah. Is he one of those guys. that when Cassick perfectly is perfect Utah, Speed, Johnwick, Shane Falco, Shane Falco works,

and even in parenthood. Perfectly casting. Smoking, gambling, little league coach. Kevin Hart turned out out, Pochino, did want to play gay character? Yeah, that's right. Some tough research on this one. He admitted, though, I mean, he said it's like my own insecurity

along those lines, but still is just kind of cool. grow up. And then most Def turned it down because he wanted to change a character to an R&B musician he didn't want to make fun

a rap. Really? So in an up I mean, did you get the sense though? But did you get the sense that he was a rap star?

Like I don't know, I felt like that was the one thing that was kind of missing. Like I didn't get... I felt like he was more like Nick Cannon or something. Yeah. Like I didn't...

He almost felt like he was a rap star five years ago who had now become... Nick Cannon is a rap star. This was sad. So Cruz vacated Rick Peck, Owen Wilson gets cast, and then Owen Wilson had

that meltdown in 07 Suicited time, sadly. Dropped out, Matthew McCona comes in. So McCona was the third choice. Which is kind of where he was in his career. Yeah. Best that guy award? I don't know.

I have Yvette Nicole Brown as Peck's assistant. It goes on to become community. I think Yvette Nicole Brown is, no? Now she is. I'm using more of a like, oh, like the background player, and then it's like, she's like got

one shot where she's like, it's like hang up the phone. At that time. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because like, she's, she's like a cultural main thing. You know what's funny? Is Danny McBride when they made this movie was that kind of like a kind of like? Yeah. Kind of, yeah. And then Eastbound made him Dana McBride. St. Christopher Walking was kind of like, I was like, oh, yeah, I just love seeing him.

Christopher Walkin. Is it that guy. Interesting. Recasting couch. I did mine in my hottest take. Did you have any? Not really. Okay. Craig did his flex. We're moving to half-assed internet research.

Dionne? You know what you didn't do Dion. Jesus. Well, it's Cruz. It's kind of Tom Cruise. Tom Cruise, right? Yeah. Are you?

You test drive, the bride? I had something for possibly in answerable questions, but I'll bring it up for Dion. Now, it's not necessarily that Les is in this movie too much for Dion, which is like a sliding kind of barometer sometimes. What would happen if there was just one less Grossman scene? Is it, does it become like one of the great one-scene cameos of all time? don't love Grossman. There's a little bit of you. No, I think Grossman is incredible on the fuck your own face one. And I'm like, you have to get a binding resolution.

I think it's the reason returns. And it almost feels like midway through. They're like, man, this is incredible. We got, we got to do another Grossman scene. Yeah. I think that it was probably Cruz's commitment to it. Like, oh, Tom's having a lot of fun. How much can, how much juice can we get out of this?

It should have been Alec Baldwin and Glenn Gary. It should have just been like, I'm speechless after that one scene. Yeah. Maybe that should have been my highest take Fuck you That would have been a good one Yeah I mean you could say

He just could have been The one scene And the end But then we don't get him Negotiating with the That seems great When he goes Lots of money

Yeah Yeah I thought the third scene Was like really good The scene at the At the very end Like that was probably A little bit too much

And then he's dancers Through the cranes But how do you guys Feel about the dance To the cranes It was kind of See like as a 14 year old I love that shit

Yeah I like shit like that For any credits Yeah Half-assed They film in Hawaii and Kauai. It's the first movie in Kauai in five years.

This is the beginning of people being like, you know, it's cool living in Hawaii for a long time. Adam Sandler really figured it out. He's like family friend vacation, Hawaii tropical location. He got married down there too, still like. So I bet that was just like. Yeah.

Donald Glover big Hawaii guy. Yeah? Yeah. We mentioned most of this stuff except Stiller Downey and Black appeared on the seventh season finale of American Idol. as the Pips performing with Gladys Knight as a...

They just before the movie came out, they promoted the shit out of this movie. They went everywhere. They popped on every show. They did American Idol shit. Van's guy, Rick Baker, designed and created the Downey makeup. Rick Baker.

The further guy. Did he do the fatties as well? He probably did everything. I wonder if he did the hands. He probably did the hands, too. Who is like the second best Rick Baker? Yeah. If it's not him, who is the who...

If you can't get Rick Baker We had John Williams, but then Who is the other guy who is almost as good as John Williams? Is it about Hans Zimmer? No. No. Jerry Goldsmith. Jerry Goldsmith.

I mean, there's a couple guys in that. Like, if you, depending on it, but if you can't get Rick Baker, who's the second Rick Baker? I don't know. It feels like Rick Baker just annihilated everybody. I think it's Stan Winston. Oh, Stan Winston.

Yeah. Stan Winston's way up there. Um, C.R mentioned the mockumentary, reign of madness. Downey at one and a half to two hours of makeup. And then they wanted, did you see the thing about how they wanted Nolte's character to be revealed like Quint Jaws? And they decided it was too many homages.

And then, um, hater said he went into audition for Tropic Thunder. Is Stan Winston Black? He, he kind of got a shell silver thing going on. He got a little situation happening. No, are we tripping about this? Stan Winston? No, I don't think it's like a, he kind of, like. He kind of, like, maybe he's just a little red here.

No, but go back, go back to the last one. Like, are we missing out of grade here? Look at that. Conno, you know. I don't know. I don't think so. Because I think I would have known. It's funny because when you said Stan Winston, I was like,

Stan Winston, I was like, a black-ass name. He's a black-ass name. Like, if you look at him right there, click it. Go to some more images. Yeah. Okay, hold on, Doug. Oh, shit. I don't know, Joe.

Oh, shit. Look at that. I don't know, bro. I don't think he is. That's a black man, bro. I don't know. I'm going to claim him, though. All right, cool.

Stan Winston. Shell Silverstein, man. I should have said anything. I'm looking at him. I don't think that he is, but I don't know, dog. Not nothing. Okay, go ahead. Yeah, no.

He's kind of coming in. We lost them. We lost them. We had him. We lost. Maybe it depends on the son. Maybe it depends on that. Yeah.

A lot skin that shows up a little bit more. Hater, the last one is Hater went to audition for Tropic Thunder and saw a possible cruise. who's playing less grossman and then all of a sudden was like this is the most important edition of my life. I've gotten nailed this and it was really nervous.

Apex Mountain. Ben still or no? Downey were in the ballpark. This is Iron Man same year. I think this is it, right? Unless you were the same was the endgame time because he's the biggest start-door.

I think so. This is... Vietnam War parodies. Would you go? What was the Charlie Sheen one? Hot shots Yeah, hot shots No, I would say this We're done with Vietnam now, right?

Yeah, culturally I wonder if we'll ever come back Like World War II Like World War II is such an unambiguous Like it's us versus evil but Yeah, that's the thing But people crave like war stories They do

They crave the band of brothers' experience Cruz no Jack Black no Brandon T Hmm Hmm Hmm No.

How do you want to call them? You should ask them when you're on the phone with them or there. I'll call them right now. Do it. I'll call them right now. Blind call to Brandon? It's kind of an awkward call. If you don't call anyone across Sasha Greer.

Was this Trappick Thunder, your apex about this? But he's using a lot of big movies. Blimey on Sasha Gray. If you don't call anybody. Did we go to the Traffic Thunder prepared together? Jay Barrishell? What was his big breakout joint? What was the name of the movie?

He's the lead of undeclared, right? I think this was the biggest thing he's been in. I mean, he's good and this is the end too. He's getting this is the end. I'm trying to look. A million dollar baby. Him is danger. I remember that.

His fucking shit is how to train your dragon. How to train your dragon. That dude's caking. He's the man. So he's the lead in how to train your dragon. Is he not? I mean, yeah. I saw a decade.

I was surprised he wanted to move back to Canada and this is the end. Apparently, that was based on real life, right? That whole relationship between all of them. McConaughey, no, hate or no. Politically incorrect, but got away with it somehow comedies. Probably still blazing saddles. Yeah. That was like the biggest comedy.

Yeah. But, yeah. I mean, 48 hours. But so, but, you know, like, think about it. All of these movies and every single one of them. Like, Rens Your Nerds, Animal House, all of them, they're all insane. mainly politically incorrect. Yeah.

I didn't have them on a list because the premises aren't, you know, but like, I don't know. I guess so. Cruz or Hank's a rare, Cruz, by the way, is 183 watchables, just extending his lead. He's four above the next guy. I love it, man.

How many Cruz movies have we not done? There's a few. Okay. What are the ones? The lap. We never did all the right moves. I'm actually a big Valkyry guy. I love it.

I don't understand. I never understood the hate. Maybe I think people would just There are a couple of movies in there That people just didn't like him anymore Like, Valcary is one of them Obviously, Edge of Tomorrow is one of them I think there are some movies that would have flown

When he was on top Like I think Oblivion would have flown I think of Oblivion? I think there's a couple movies in there That people were just like Vanilla Scar What did you think of Vanilla Scar? I mean, it's a good movie

But I think Reacher is the number one For me with this People were just done with him We're just done with them If the movie was cool That movie's good We're just not fucking with Tom Cruise Yeah

It was also like The whole idea was you were supposed to be six foot five. They didn't like that either. Scorsese or Spielberg? Spielberg. Spielberg? I think so.

I would say Scorsese. I want to hear what you guys said. I really could not think of you. I just, I guess there's... All the heroin in the last... He just came out of... I think it would be a darker movie of Scalibur.

What's the funniest is he's ever been? Oh, man, Wolf of Wall Street. Yeah, wolf. Yeah. That's good. Wolf, yeah. That's very funny. Good fellas. Hey, look, I found a wing.

You want the breast of the wing. It's his hoof. Pick a Nitz. So, Steve Coogan, the director, his plan was to, he filmed a whole bunch of stuff and then got rid of everything he filmed. Yeah, this is the biggest nitpick is that he's going to put cameras in the jungle. But he's got, those are like high eight, like, camcorders. And he's, and we're just, this is what we're going to do with five-time Oscar.

It's going to look like 28 days later. What was this? What was this plan? Well, also, can I just, I'm confused because four leaf at the beginning, I say, So there were 10 people in this unit Four people wrote books Three get and two get movies out of that right? Yeah Didn't nobody know he was a fraud before then?

Right I mean it didn't say there's people that died So nobody was like Hey man you weren't there What the fuck you're talking about? Figure that would happen It probably would happen But there was a little bit of it

It's like I think people got away with a lot back then I had I don't know why tug kills a panda I don't understand that scene at all That was weird Because I think he's just scared that he's getting attacked by like a wild war. Why is there a panda? But he loves pandas, right?

And that's like the thing he loved, you know, he took the... With some panda on there? That's probably not even a real name. Well, I know that pandas are in Vietnam, but also, like, are they violent? I don't know. I don't know. I didn't understand anything about that. Why didn't the first guerrillas just kill Tug?

Why did they capture him? Wouldn't you just shoot him? To ransom him. They didn't know that he was ransomable. They assumed he was DEA, right? Yeah. Probably wants to see what he knew. And then nobody, none of these guys died, they get shot at for two hours.

Yeah. Nobody hits anybody. And they're all shooting blanks. Yeah. The only people that died were a bat, that panda, and, you know. This entire movie is a knit. Like, the plot is just like, the whole movie is in it. By the time they're walking through the jungle, like, they're fake shooting the movie.

It doesn't make any fun of six. Also, Danney's keeping that makeup on just for five straight weeks in the jungle. Well, it's mouth surgery. Yeah, surgery. But he has the other stuff that he pulls off. Oh, yeah, all that stuff. Can you all explain, like, because are his eyes blue like that naturally? No, his Australian, when he's in Satan's alley, those eyes are fake.

Those are contacts, and then his eyes are dark usually, yeah. Okay. Yeah. I had the only nitpick I have is like just Kirk Lazarus having more Oscars than Hepburn and Daniel Day-Lois. Yeah, three would have probably done the job. Maybe that was a joke. You have any nitpicks? Nah.

Craig, you have any new picks? Don't you think Four Leaf should have died? I thought they were leading up to him sacrificing himself to be like, I'll die on the battlefield now. They just keep him alive, which kind of just made no sense. Which is probably why, like, the third act feels a little bit, like... I just do not understand what he is because there's just no... Yeah, there's no consequences to it.

I think they're probably rushing through the last half hour of this. Sequel, prequel, prestige, TV, all black castor untouchable. Prestige TV's mildly interesting to me. But it's probably untouchable because I don't know if we can touch it. It's untouchable the same way plutonium is untouchable. I don't know. I mean, that's what Scorcher 7 comes in for me. It's just like he's moving on.

Yeah. You know, this is the next project. He's won his Oscar. So what do we do with Scorcher 7 after Global Men? Meltdown. Maybe it's like a... I would do Scorcher 7. They go to another planet.

Oh, yeah. Scorchor 7, like interstellar. Scor 3, though. Is that... They go to another planet. Is this movie better with Wayne Jenkins, Fergie the Flores, Zainlow, Robert Evans,

Dr. Charles Nichols, or someone else? I like the idea is if Posse Waite played Grossman. You're going to have to call the fucking United Nations and get a fucking binding resolution to keep me from fucking destroying you. I'm talking scorched earth

motherfucker. I will massacre you. I will fuck you up. The chemical way. And then he hangs up and goes, find out who that was. I had I think Nell should have been in this. There was some simple jack for

O'Brien. Where it could have been like Nell 2 when they're talking about possible Academy Awards and we could have got Nell. Maybe it could have been a rom-com like they're Buh-B-B-A-B-A-B-A-B-A-A-B-A. Another movie, Joel?

Nell? Just Jody Foster. With Jody Foster going nuts? Jody Foster in the woods? Jody Foster plays a woman who was, like, raised in the wild. Yo, bro. N-M-A-M-A-M-M-A-M-M-A-M-M-A-M-B-A-M-ha-B. Yeah, we used to really cook.

We're going to have to do it on the pod. What the fuck-the-fart. It's a fucking insane. It's a-old. What the shit, no. That can't be right. That was another one that paved the way for Simple Jack, by the way. Damn.

That was just be in the forest and be crazy. Hold on. Nell made 33 million domestic. For some reason, the world was fucking with Nell like crazy. People in this huge in France. And France loves Jody Foster. So when I was in a newspaper, the person did a story on this woman who was raised by wolves.

Like she was like, and it became a big story. Did they do a movie on that? Did they ever do a movie? That sounds like something that should have become a movie. She was raised by... She was raised by... She was raised by somebody that wasn't doing in. I haven't been fired Nell up in a while.

We'll crank it up. Probably in answerable questions. Why do you think Cruz didn't do more Dan Waiters type three-day roles? I always wonder about this with some of the most famous. Like, would it have killed Leo to have done this like twice?

You know? Denzel. All the biggest stars we have, it's just a huge win if they pick the right movie and they just fly into it. But it's not a wrong movie. Yeah. Is that what it is?

It's just a fear of... Yeah. But, I mean, also, I mean, these are people that really do take that craft very seriously, too. Like, it's just not fucking around. So maybe that... It could... I wonder if it's just a simple way. They were asking DeCaprio to be in Cliff Booth, and he was like, no.

Not for, like, a day. No. You think Michael Jones is playing in a pro-am? Yeah, so he used to, yeah. But I just think you have to be at the right point in your career. Right. And, like, these guys are chasing each other in terms of prestige. And a miscalculation, kind of.

looks bad. I always like to see it. So like Shalameh right now. Just popping in a movie for two days that ends up being hit. He's really funny. He'll do it. Matt Damon will do it.

Yeah. Matt Damon loves to do it. Matt Damon loves to do it. He's in Eurotrip for reasons that remain unclear. With a shaved head. But here's a deal though. And he shows up in some of the Marvel stuff. It's funny.

But when you're in, when you're watching Euro Trip and he's up there, to me he looks so cool. Yeah. Just popping into that movie. But there's a difference between, like, what he does in that and what he does in Interstellar. You know what I mean? Like, there's, like, a supporting role,

and then there's, like, a 10-minute, like, cameo. Yeah, the interstellar thing is actually, like, a really super important part of a very serious movie, so... What do you got for an answer, both? Oh, for me? Oh, uh, I would just like to know why Brandon Jackson was the guy. I'm sorry.

I'm no offense to you a guy. Like, what happened to his career after this? Yeah, I'm just like, what... I mean, why didn't... I mean, we were just talking about all these guys that gone on. They had him, like, another thing. And, like, what, again, I think that is the problem of the black actor in Hollywood, not your boy. That's what I'm saying.

It's like, you know, because oftentimes these roles, even if you get nominated for something, it doesn't necessarily mean that you're going to go on, you know. So, like, Lupita, you know what I'm saying? Like, it didn't, it has not made her a huge star. Lupita, is having a fucking fantastic career. Are you nuts? Do you think, do you think of her as, like, a top-bill star? Lupita is having a great career.

Okay. No, I'm not saying she's not having a great career. You can have a great career and not be, like, a top billing type actress. Right, right. Like, yeah, yeah. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. It's going to be, like, the roles are just not going to come to her like they do some other people.

And I'm sure she would say that if you ask her. Okay, look, I don't know. Like, all I'm saying is... Well, you probably do know her calling. That's your home girl calling. My own answerable would be, if you were making Tropic Thunder today, what would you be lampooning? Like, and I guess it would be comic book movies. Hmm.

It's not really unanswerable because I answered it to myself. MCU type of something. If I was doing it, I would lampoon the high arture movie. The MCU is going to go further. But I think now the film that's directly, that's like an A24 movie? Yeah, kind of the A24 film bro type of movie that like everybody has to love. I mean, honestly, the funniest thing would be to do like the smartless guys. Like a movie about

Like, yeah, some sort of big gigantic podcast Or comedy Where that would be cinematic Where that would be great You just dive into that whole world With the celebrities that come in But you're really making fun

Of a couple different things of that world People trying to make the guests cry And the dates all that stuff Yeah Although Charlize talking about how she didn't want to be married And just had sex with the 26 year old And it was great I thought that was some of the best podcast content of the year

Didn't you have Charlize on your show? I sure did. We never talked about her having sex with the younger men. That never came up. It was in a different phase of her life. Yeah. She came in the office. Most flustered I've ever met.

You bad at the baby wins at her? She just sat down, put her arm in. She was just ready to roll. She was so cool. She plays big back game in person. That's the big thing I learned. I don't know how to play backgame and I saw that about her. Yeah, you would learn for Charlize, I bet.

Two days in the Valley. Piece of memorabilia you'd want from this movie. The giant Simple Jack cardboard thing that McConaughey had. Yeah. You know what I'm talking about? Yeah. It was in the back and it had like, it seemed like Simple Jack was moving back and forth on it. It was like, it was like, amazing.

If you replaced Farah Fawcett in your house and Simple Jack. I was thinking about that. Then I was like, oh, yeah, I can't have that. But I thought it was hilarious. I think any number of the Bluetooth headsets or Blackberries or like old 2008 phones. Yeah, the answer is the Qualcomm phone or the TiVo that McConae asked the box. I would love to have a can of booty sweat on my office desk.

That's a great one. Yeah, the original movie worn booty. Bussing the bar. Coach Finstock, Mr. Biaggyware for Best Worst Life Lesson. Porn sets the tone for everybody else. Porn leaves the way. Yeah, for sure. Best double feature choice here?

I had Zoolander just as like another satire by the, And sore. I had hot shots. Dead presidents. Oh, good one. That's a good one. I had the player. What do you have, Craig?

Double feature? Yeah. I'd probably stick right in 08. Go stepbrothers right after it. That's good. Who won the movie? Downing. Downy to me.

Craig, go. I was 14 when this came out, 2008. Just like, I can't... The summer of 2008, We're getting Sarah Marshall, get smart, stepbrothers, Pineapple Express, Tropic Thunder, and Role Models. Crazy.

Wow. Like, in the year before that, had five other hits, and the year after that, had five more hits. No, you're 14, you're rolling. I mean, this was, like, everything in the world. Like, this is just like the funniest shit ever. I mean, all of these movies, but I couldn't believe how many quotes from this movie I remembered. I haven't seen it probably 10 years. And I could probably have done the whole movie from memory. I don't know.

It's just fantastic across the board. What's the comedy summer of you guys' youth? It's probably like closer to like 84 or 86 or something like that. Yeah, mine's the 80 to 82 with like, you know, Caddyshack, Blues Brothers, Airplane. Because sadly when I'm crazy, it's when like comedy is having like a little bit of like a drunken hangover. Like I'm more like my 14 year old summer is probably more like another 48 hours. And that's like that's not as good.

It's Beverly Hills Copsequels, you know? I'm probably like 2000 foot I was a big feral fan so like Anchorman Talladega Knights stepbrothers like that was my shit

you know I'll sit down and watch Talladega Nights It really is just so different Like what I expected at that age in a comedy I mean it was just the biggest stars in the world All together on a big set

Just fucking around Yeah I mean that is so foreign To what you see today I mean they were very much fucking around Like I said At the end of the movie I mean it was just like

Yeah just the idea of giving these guys $90 million to do this. He's nuts. Also, you kind of got to give it to Tom Cruise a little bit. Like, the performance itself is very funny, but the fact that he came up with the character, came up with the look of the character, apparently it was his idea to play Flowrida. It's kind of like, Tom Cruise? Yeah. Okay. Plus having problems with Katie Holmes at that point.

Well, I was going to say, he also hung out with Jamie Fox around that time, too. You know what I'm saying? Oh, that's right. They were all like part of, you know, then Jamie moved in there. Dan's like, I have no comment at this time. I'm fucking with it. So what's the play now? Can I say I love Tropic Thunder or no? Of course you can't.

Yeah. Like if I'm like, Downey Jr. and Tropic Thunder are hilarious. Is that fine? I mean, I can't give permission. You're on your own.

You might have to answer a few more follow-ups. You know what I'm saying? You think so? I mean, I think you could get away from it the good way with it. The question is,

could Bill. If Bill is somewhere- because I was 14 when I saw it? In Charleston. And he's talking to people and he asks Bill what's favorite movies. He's like,

I love Downy and Tropic Thoux I think probably at that point. You gotta be able to be a great performance by a black person. You can't just be like, my favorite performance by a black guy is Robert Downey, Cheneer. When Van does Boston, he becomes Australian.

He becomes Kurt Lazarus. You know, my favorite performance by black guys is... My favorite performance by a black guy is Jay McDaniels. In the first round against... Oh, ended the Joker? Yeah, that's my favorite performance. That's a bad. That was a man.

I love him. Fan loves it. Yeah. Van loves when the Joker goes down. Oh, wait, is this a race thing? Are you anti-joke-do? Do you realize what happened last weekend? Van Joker got eliminated, the Celtics got eliminated,

and Great White freaked out at the Kentucky Derby. It's like a huge fan weekend. Van sees Joker as an extension of the one battle after another argument. That's not true. See, you guys are turning to people. That's not true. All I'm saying is I understand he's a badass motherfucker. And by the way, the success just.

beat me down. I just heard that he was the greatest of all time, and I'll say, can't we pump the brakes on that? That's all I said. So do you think, do you think like he got punked, by the way, too? Like when he ran up on Jaden and he got pumped. He was like, he didn't want to get thrown out of the game. He needed a fight.

They don't want to run over there. Don't run over there. Because as he was running over there, intending to kill Jaden McDaniels, he realized I can't get thrown out for the series. And he was probably also like, oh, I just realized my brothers aren't at this game. He ran too far And while you're running, you're thinking if it had been shorter

And then when he got there, Jaden did not Yeah, he did not He didn't back up It was like, oh, dog, we're about to fight If you come up and yoga's just like, nah If it beat it run over, he just would have run into him And then fall in death And the first call

You're so sad. You let them get that off? Get your shot, you get your shit off. You beat him. Like you let him get that off, you beat him. You beat him. I'll do a Twitch stream later where I address it. Yeah.

play by play. Look at this. They let everybody else push off. What about me? I can't push off. It's my favorite year ever where I play by myself and Jason Dayton wasn't there.

I hate my rocket so much that I don't even care that your Lakers won. That's tough. That's it for the rewatch of us. Joe, thank you for doing this. Yeah, thanks for having me on. Thanks to get out.

Thanks to Gail and Eduardo in the back as well. Thanks to Joel. Great to see you, that was awesome. I'm happy. Thanks for having me on, man. You can hear Joel on the press box

and watch him and on Ringer Tailgate. The Best Ringer Podcast. we have. Wow. At least in the top 40. At least in the top 40. Bottom quarter, I think, at least.

It's a good college football season ahead. A lot of good arguments coming. You say football's return? Arch Maining. Is it important for me to, is it, should I, I shouldn't bring up UCLA right now, should I? No. We'll do it later. All right.

Good to see you, see you too, bud. Next week, by the way, not sure we're doing yet, but it will be a comedy. So there you go. See you next week. Hey, y'all. It's Kelly Clarkson with Wayfair. Ever order furniture online and wonder, what if? Like, what if it doesn't hold up?

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